“Yasukuni Shrine, Fat People, and You"
Hot Tears of Shame – The Way to Virgin Space – Episode Eleven
The James T. Hong Interview
James T. Hong is an Asian-American film and video maker based in San Francisco, California, whose works tend to focus on controversial race and class issues. His films and videos include Behold the Asian: How One Becomes What One Is, Condor: A Film from California, The Form of the Good, Taipei 101: A Travelogue of Symptoms, and The Spear of Destiny.
Opening crawl read by Clarissa Graffeo, featuring Daryl Surat as “Alphabet Drake”
(excerpt)
The forces of Counter-ESPY have heroically triumphed over the
Mysterian invaders. But the experimental sonic weaponry employed in
the battle has caused immense damage to the Earth's harmonic frequency
range, and the Overtones -sentient sound vibrations created by the
planet's magnetic field - are now threatened with extinction.
In a desperate bid for survival, Mystery Frequency 109 assumes the
guise of a Beautiful and Alluring Space Woman, and vanishes altogether
from the solar system. The loss of its ambient magical energy may
prove to be fatal. Unless the Frequency is restored to the Overtones,
the Earth will descend into the lower astral regions in exactly one
leap year.
To avert this disaster, Counter-EPSY has created a mammoth
electro-graavic anti-gravity space cruiser out of Heavy Element 115.
Equipped with hyper-motion missiles, re-orientable runways, a shopping
district and an extra-sensory third bridge, the ship is named the
"Cosmo Jack" and Patrick has been narrowcasted deep inside its hull.
His mission: to pilot the ship into the unknown super-galaxy known as
Virgin Space where the Mystery Frequency is believed to be hiding.
But blocking the Cosmo Jack's way is the villainous Alphabet Drake, a
being dedicated to infiltrating the English language with the use of
his demonic Letter People. Drake also seeks the way to Virgin Space
and has already announced his intentions to the world by using our
upper ionosphere as his own personal one-way walkie-talkie…
Relevant Links
James T. Hong’s ZUKUNFTSMUSIK homepage
The Coldest War Illustrated Screenplay
San Francisco Bay Guardian Interview with James T. Hong
Hey, what's the song under the opening crawl? Sounds so familiar...
Posted by: Matt Schley | August 18, 2006 at 08:50 AM
It's the main theme from the anime movie "Crusher Joe." Symphonic Suite version, slightly sped up.
Posted by: Patrick Macias | August 18, 2006 at 08:53 AM
That was my guess. Now I gotta go watch Crusher Joe again. Thanks!
Posted by: Matt Schley | August 18, 2006 at 09:16 AM
Nice! Worth the 5 hours it took to d/l on the dialup!
I am surprised at one thing however, that Mr. Hong didn't make more out of the irony of his getting that press pass at the shrine. Not until the BIG AMERICAN JOURNALISTS (assumed white) stepped in was he sanctioned...the image in my head of this event is very very not P.C. (it involves cowboy hats and boots, American flags, bad accents and slurs such as 'you danged japper-knees')
Also I have to wonder, the people dressed in WW II uniforms. *ARE* they there to worship the dead, or are they just cosplaying in the only venue that's acceptable to their brand of freak-on? I suppose it could be both.
Posted by: Steve Harrison | August 20, 2006 at 11:49 PM
Hmm... I thought I mentioned it was ironic I needed the white Americans to help me out. Beer doesn't help.
Koizumi finally made it on 8/15. Abe?
Posted by: JTH | September 05, 2006 at 07:28 PM