For this Special Thursday Cinema Night, 8PM EST, it’s Japanese David Bowie POW drama Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (1983) and holiday rom-com Sleepless in Seattle (1993)! (CWs inside)

IMPORTANT NOTE: please use a VPN whenever visiting Blorptube, or anywhere else on the internet, for that matter. Protect your privacy.

For this Special Thursday Cinema Night, first up is Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence (1983), a Japanese WW2 drama starring David Bowie as a British POW in a Japanese prison camp on Java in 1942. The camp’s commandment (Ryuichi Sakamoto) is a brutal disciplinarian, while the prisoners’ leader, the eponymous Lawrence (Tom Conti), attempts to use his knowledge of Japanese culture and language to improve the treatment of his British comrades. Bowie plays the role of mediator in his attempts for the two sides to understand each other. Can the Christmas spirit flourish in a POW camp? I guess we’ll see. We previously watched director Nagisa Oshima’s capital-punishment satire Death by Hanging (1968), and it was great, so let’s check this one out too. Ryuichi Sakamoto’s score for this film is one of the most famous in Japanese cinema.

After that is Sleepless in Seattle (1993), a rom-com set during Christmastime, which features the son of a recently-widowed man (Tom Hanks) calling into a radio show in search for a new lady for his dad. One woman (Meg Ryan) who hears the story becomes instantly infatuated with it, writing to the guy to propose they meet atop the Empire State Building. A bunch of wholesomely-comic antics follow from there in feel-good fashion. Director Nora Ephron also did the similarly-themed You’ve Got Mail (1998), which even stars the same actors. This was a big hit at the time, and became everyone’s mom’s favorite movie in the 90s. Let’s give it a whirl.

We’ll start at 8PM EST on Blorptube, right here:

https://blorp.bot.nu/o/visual_cuisine

Be there, comrades!

Letterboxd:

Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence: https://letterboxd.com/film/merry-christmas-mr-lawrence/
Sleepless in Seattle: https://letterboxd.com/film/sleepless-in-seattle/

Doesthedogdie.com links:

Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence: https://www.doesthedogdie.com/media/22231
Sleepless in Seattle: https://www.doesthedogdie.com/media/11288

CWs for Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence:

Decapitation.
Jump scares.
Child abuse.
Alcohol abuse.
Implied sexual assault. Not depicted.
Discussion of sexual assault.
Torture.
Leg injury.
Shaving.
Someone is buried alive.
Someone struggles to breathe.
Spitting.
Hospital scene.
Suicide.
Suicide attempt.
Self-harm.
Homophobia.
Ableism.
Hate speech.
Death of LGBT person.
Blood and gore.
Gun violence.
Sad ending.

CWs for Sleepless in Seattle:

Stalking.
Shaving.
Death of parent.
Profanity.
Homophobic slurs.
Misgendering.
“Man in dress” jokes.
Transphobic slur.
Honking horns.
Screeching tires.

Links to movies:

Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence: https://tankie.tube/w/gVhiXFzSZjSGHcTQKNYfDJ
Sleepless in Seattle: https://tankie.tube/w/182AUacTbGEHocuUZwS3Z5