Says she has received materials for "upcoming big-screen adaptation," unsure about casting
MTV.com's Larry Carroll asked Lindsay Lohan about rumors she would be cast in a new Sailor Moon movie:
The people behind the upcoming big-screen adaptation of the Japanese manga series "Sailor Moon" have sent her some materials to look at, she said, and fans have begun lobbying hard for Lohan to play the titular character, a rail-thin blonde known for her strong powers and sexy costumes.
"I read that [online] the other day," Lohan said of her supposed "Sailor" casting. "I haven't read the script; I don't even know if there is a script. ... I read a lot of things [online] that I don't know about myself that apparently people think are true."
ANN earlier reported rumors of a Sailor Moon movie announcement in Animage magazine were untrue. No further details about the potential movie are available.
Bernie Mac Joins Transformers Movie
The BBC reports Bernie Mac and Josh Duhamel have signed onto Michael Bay's upcoming Transformers movie. Mac will reportedly play a salesman who gives star Shia LaBeouf his first Transformer. The $100 million film comes out July 2007
Musician Masahiro Kawasaki Dies
Masahiro Kawasaki, the composer of Street Fighter, Ninja Scroll, and Dagger of Kamui, passed away Thursday. He was 56.
Death Note, XXXHOLiC Novels in the Works
Author Nisho Ishin announced here and here that he will write novelizations of Death Note and XXXHOLiC. Both books will be released August 1 in Japan
Just plain disturbing: Japan's newest batch of idols on the wrong side of 10
Japan is sick. Not satisfied with a booming market in the borderline pedophile Under-15 pin-up princess business, now there's 9-year-old cheesecake going mainstream, according to Shukan Post (5/19).
Japan's market for pubescent pin-up queens has already proved to be lucrative, with thousands of perverted consumers forking out their hard-earned yen for a DVD filled with images of a scantily-clad 11-year-old called Saaya, who is billed as a "kyonyu," or "buxom" idol.
Saaya has also joined forces with California-born 12-year-old Jessica and another 12-year-old called Shizuka Umemoto to form a group called Sweet Kiss, which has Japan's nerdish otaku drooling lecherously at the various signings and "handshake events" they attend, the men's weekly says.
Now, however, Japan is stooping even lower with the emergence of 9-year-old Mizuki Yoshii, who has become the face of Japan's vile but burgeoning Under-10 idol business.
Born on May 15, 1996, Mizuki still hasn't reached double figures. But her sales figures are already impressive. Her photo collection went on sale in March, with the initial print run set at 6,000 copies. It has already gone into a second printing and topped 10,000 copies, the standard for a best seller in Japan. What's more, hits on her talent agency's website have skyrocketed since the 9-year-old appeared on the scene.
Mizuki's photo collection is little more than pedophilia. She appears clad in all sorts of garments, the vast majority of them scanty, and the shots cater to the traditional sick tastes of perverts, with the little girl decked out in her school uniform, PE bloomers and swimsuit -- all staples for child cheesecake fans in Japan.
Producers of the pre-pubescent pseudo-porn argue that there's nothing wrong with it.
"We did the shoot over 3 1/2 days in Okinawa in November last year. She doesn't need any make-up, so the shoot went really smoothly," an insider involved in the production of the photo collection tells Shukan Post. "We weren't trying to make her look sexy. We just wanted to display her in all the cuteness that's associated with somebody her age."
Nonetheless, Mizuki is made to strike pseudo-erotic poses, such as seductively licking an ice cream, that the men's weekly says are titillating.
And unfortunately, it seems the Under-10 market is viewed as something of potentially stable one.
"At the moment, Japan's pin-up market is polarized, with Aki Hoshino, at 28, representing the oldest segment of the market and the Under-15s at the other end," Masahiro Kitagawa, a self-professed "idol spotter," tells Shukan Post. "The weakening of Japanese men means guys now place a lot of importance on imagining they have control over the opposite sex, which has sparked the emergence of the Under-15 market. The way they've got the girls changing costumes all the time is supposed to be a way to satisfy guys' various fantasies. The polarization of the market is likely to continue, but I don't think it will go any lower than the Under-10s."
Allergy sufferers just itchin’ for kissin’
BostonHerald.com -Tuesday, May 9, 2006 …
[Japanese] Scientists have discovered that just 30 minutes of kissing can diminish the body’s allergic reaction to pollen. Test showed it relaxed the body and reduced production of histamine, a chemical cell given out in response to allergens.
Dr Hajime Kimata of a Japan research team: “The results indicate for the first time that kissing may alleviate allergic responses.”
Some 24 men and women with hay fever were told to spend half an hour kissing their partners. Blood samples were taken before and after to test levels of immunoglobulin E (IgE), which prompts the release of histamine into the blood, triggering symptoms of hay fever and asthma.