Our mark is 銀幕, ginmaku — the silver screen, and the same two characters in Japanese, Chinese and Korean.

I came to Tokyo at twenty-three for a summer job at a Shibuya mini-theatre and the job never quite ended. Fifteen years of festivals later I still think the only review that counts is the one the room gives you: where the laugh lands, the moment three hundred people stop moving at once, whether anybody stays for the credits.

Cinepuuulse follows Asian cinema — Japan, Korea, China, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Vietnam, Thailand — across about a hundred and twenty sources. A good number of them are Spanish, French and Portuguese, because those countries programme this work seriously and write about it better than most of the English-language trade. Genre and art-house get the same seat here. I am not ranking them, and nothing is scored out of ten.

Each story is a headline, a short excerpt, one still and a link to the outlet that did the reporting. We never republish the piece, and the still belongs to its studio or its photographer. A Korean trade paper appears in Korean, a French review in French. We point at the work; we do not put words in anyone's mouth.

— Daren Wise, Tokyo

← Cinepuuulse Archive

In Review Online

Ali G: Who Iz I? — Sacha Baron Cohen [Review]

10.22Work

Sacha Baron Cohen must have depleted the water supply of approximately 17 townships to present us with all of the following: AI-generated Hitler and Greta Thunberg rapping about blowjobs…

Read at In Review Online ↗

One letter a week, starting soon.

Latest

Ali G: Who Iz I? — Sacha Baron Cohen [Review]

More from In Review Online on Cinepuuulse

A Talent for Murder — Anton Corbijn [Review] In Review Online

Sacrifice — Romain Gavras [Review] In Review Online

Hallowarrior — Ben Sottak [Review] In Review Online

One Last Shot — James Nunn [Review] In Review Online

Sense and Sensibility — Georgia Oakley [Review] In Review Online

Norm: The Tale of Norm Macdonald — Judd Apatow [Review] In Review Online