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

Little White Lies

Rebellion – first-look review

October 14Work

This inspiring and hopeful documentary pithily tells the story of the 1981 defence of the Bradford Twelve. It’s hard not to feel numb to today’s endlessly grim headlines.

Read at Little White Lies ↗

One letter a week, starting soon.

Latest

Rebellion – first-look review

More from Little White Lies on Cinepuuulse

Case 137 review – dodgy cops get a taste of their own medicine Little White Lies

Forgotten Island review – pop-culture nostalgia overload Little White Lies

Naza review – confronting the horrors of genocide Little White Lies

Amanda Kramer: ‘Being a beautiful woman has fear inside it’ Little White Lies

By Design review – seat of learning Little White Lies

Ray Gunn – first-look review Little White Lies