My Brother / Shintaro Ishihara DVD

Starring: SNagase Tomoya, Watari Tetsuya, Yukie Nakama, Miura Tomokazu, Takashima Reiko

Language: Japanese

Subtitle: English/Chinese/Malay

Media Type: NTSC, All Regions

No of CDs: 3 DVDs (5 episodes)

Telecast: Nov 2004 (TV Asahi)

Shipping Origin: MALAYSIA

Rating for English subtitled: Good

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In Japan's cinematic realm of the late 1950's and early 1960's, Ishihara Yujiro was The King! Out of literally billions of movie tickets sold at that time, well over half were to features produced by Nikkatsu the bulk of which starred Yujiro. More than just a popular screen idol, Ishihara made an incredibly powerful impact on Japanese popular culture. He became an icon to and for the modern-minded, rebellious, youth of that tumultuous period; a sort of Japanese amalgamation of Elvis Presely, Marlon Brando, and James Dean.

Yujiro came from a fairly wealthy family. He and his brother, writer and politician, Ishihara Shintaro, were the sons of a senior shipping executive. Shintaro graduated from Hitotsubashi University with the strong desire to be a novelist. Yujiro graduated from Keio with the dream of becoming an actor. Fortune smiled on both of the lads.

Shintaro wrote a bestselling novel, "Taiyo no Kisetsu" ("Seasons in the Sun"), and Yujiro was chosen to star in the film version. The novel and the film became the "first chronicling" of the Taiyo Zoku (Sun Tribe), a term derived, by the media, to describe the then prominent "new wave" of discontented Japanese youth. If the media were to be believed, Japan (just ike the US at the time) was being "invaded" by wild teenagers who shocked their elders with their apparent lack of morals and live-fast-die-young attitudes! The role of just such a "youth in orbit" fit Ishihara Yujiro like a sheath for a sword. Nikkatsu's film slashed all previous box office records and shot its star to the top!