Recap of yesterday's meeting! 8/5/10 edition!

Yesterday was a lot of fun! We had more than half a dozen new faces that will hopefully return to future club meetings! I know at least a couple got to see their first Satoshi Kon film, which is always a good thing!

NEWS

Not much going on in convention land in town, but Anime Weekend Atlanta is less than two weeks away and EXPcon is in a month. Make plans accordingly if you want to go!

We talked of our fourth year anniversary plans and it looks like the weekend of October 23rd might be the time to celebrate! (The real anniversary is October 22nd, a Friday.) We'll figure that out soon enough. Ideas for the party consist of dressing up in costume, eating sweets, watching horror anime, and going to Rocky's Replay. Any other ideas would be appreciated! (Costumes are optional, by the way.)

We have about eight more meetings left in the year, which will hopefully be enough time to finish all of our current series and start fresh next year! We discussed what features will show in those meetings, and My Neighbor Totoro, Evangelion 2.22: You Can (Not) Advance, Royal Space Force: The Wings of Honneamise, Sword of the Stranger, Memories, Metropolis will be in there. If we can get Macross: Do You Remember Love? and Lupin III: The Last Job, that will round up our feature showings for the year!

Order of showings are still being worked out but Totoro and Eva 2.22 will be the next ones we will watch.

SHOWING RECAP

First off, High School of the Dead was not shown. There are several reasons as to why it was not shown. It may have not been a good idea to select it for showing in the first place. There's not anything said or done in the show that hasn't already been done hundreds of times and it's unknown whether a zombie survival show like this could stay interesting for more than a few episodes, let alone sixteen.

With that said, a club member gave me a really interesting suggestion after the end of the previous meeting. His concerns were that we have been lacking a series that has that drama and tension along the lines of something like Grave of Fireflies. He told me of a 2008 anime that was in the noitaminA block on Fuji TV.

Recap of yesterday's meeting! 6/6/10 edition!

News

• A new anime night hosted by yours truly will be showing up at Tatame Lounge in Winter Park! It's called Kanpai, Anime! and it will take place on the last Tuesday of every month. The goal is to show an noteworthy anime film to an adult crowd while sake and tea is consumed. The first one will be on June 29th and the showing will be Evangelion 1.11: You Are (Not) Alone!
• Our friend David M. had to leave Florida to return to his home state. The circumstances are unfortunate and we wish him the best! Stay in touch, dude!
• A new member came into club who is not a film student! Nothing against film students, but diversity in the club is a good thing!
• Nothing new on the future hangout with Anime Spot. They did have a meeting after ours so hopefully, they figured out what the want to do with us. I did mention that I suggest Boardwalk Bowl as an idea to them.
• Once Gungrave ends, members of the club want Black Lagoon to take it's place.

Mystery Feature

As you can tell from the top image, our mystery feature was indeed Studio Ghibli and Isao Takahata's Grave of the Fireflies, a World War II movie that shows the tragic and desperate struggle of two orphaned children as Japan fell to America. While sometimes light hearted, it is an overall depressing film that shows the harsh tragedies of war from the perspective of the losing side.

For that reason, Grave of the Fireflies is considered a taboo movie to show at anime clubs across the nation. Obviously I had to show it. The chances that some club members have never seen the movie and otherwise may not have been exposed to it made me feel obligated to do so. I also find this to be one of the most mature things that we could possibly show and I strongly feel that it would have been a good experience for some of the younger club members to watch this. 

I wanted this showing to be a mystery because I didn't want to scare anyone off from attending the meeting. Nobody in club would intentionally go to feel sadness so it had to be a secret. This is a strong film and I am proud of everyone who watched it yesterday. For club regulars who were not there: imagine two hours where everyone was silent, not playing games, and focused intently on watching the film. It's a feat that sounds impossible, but that is the power this movie possesses.

This club doesn't have to be like other clubs that have plagued themselves with yaoi and moe fandom, or have regulated their showings to cheap thrill anime that offer instant gratification but are ultimately shallow. While we have shown those kind of works in the past(well, not the yaoi), it is definitely a positive that this club is sometimes able to watch anime that can be serious, thoughtful, and artistic.

With that being said, how did you all feel about watching this movie yesterday? Have you seen it before or was this your first time? I would like to know those things.