Murakami Testplay: 100% Perfect

[Baumiao86]

Great video for a fantatsic story.

Five stars

[Paul186]

Jeez-excellent selection from his writing. Liked the music. It's a strange talent-being adept at simple statements and expressing what millions don't or can't reveal every day. Enjoyed your brief sketch.

[kampouridis]

Is that an extract from The Darkside???

[invadertaco777]

This is so cool. I love Old Boy's Soundtrack, I just fell in love with Murakami's work (just finished my first book of his)--them combined with your art and imagination= 100% Perfect!

[KrispyMike]

I finished this video a while back. to see the completed version, just check out my channel. Thanks for the comment =) ~M

[invadertaco777]

Yeah, I checked it out and loved the full version! You inspired me to do a live version sometime.  When we do I will send the link! Thanks so much!

[KOSI55]

genial murakami es simplemente genial lastima q algunas personas d japon no valoren lo q ste hombre hace atraves d su escritura basta kn leer after dark pero bueno en gustos se rompen generos

[KrispyMike]

que?

[Bambolina07]

I love music

Yeong Wook Jo - The Last Waltz

[immolation22]

very well done, id like to see the whole thing. the "zoom ins" were good, the music was good, the pace was great.

[KrispyMike]

I do have the whole thing remade and completed. Check out my channel, it's all there. ~M

[kuramasohma]

Great!

[pumpkincouture]

I just randomly flipped through a korean manga called "100% perfect girl" and the first two pages are basically this video. Oh, and the discussion of serious business literature made me laugh. Who cares if some people don't like Murakami? As long as this video is good, it really shouldn't matter.

[KrispyMike]

SO TRUE! You're comment rocks!

~M -----------Oh and I have the completed version of this video on my channel

[moloko36]

so many cliches. FYI Murakami does not speak for japanese, he is pulling your leg and the wool over your eyes. Here in Japan to mention Murakami is to say you dont read much. his readership base is 17-27 years old.

[animefreak10117]

where is the background music from it sounds so familiar!

[KrispyMike]

It's from the Korean revenge movie "OldBoy"

[animefreak10117]

i never saw that... hmmmmmm

[norobabe]

Cuando lees a Murakami, te sumerges en una espiral de sentimientos tan distintos y a la vez tan iguales, que lo cotidiano se hace extraordinario. Sólo decirte: termina el trabajo. Me gustó.

[Bambolina07]

I really LOVED THAT!!!

[sydsnap]

its good but you took pictures

[baubau85]

great job, it is very intense..5 stars

Ottimo lavoro, veramente molto profondo..cinque stelle

[KrispyMike]

ATTENTION: In about a week's time I'll have the completed version uploaded. It's great, I hopw every one will enjoy it. ~M

[Bambolina07]

please remind me WHat book was that...This is a GREAT video!!!

[KrispyMike]

It was from "The Elephant Vanishes" ~M

[Bambolina07]

Thank you very MUCH!! I like your job!!! What is the name of music?? who is the composer??

[KrispyMike]

The song is called "the last waltz" it's from the soundtrack of a korean movie titled "OldBoy" ~M

[Bambolina07]

I just got that book :-) ....

[rumesto]

It's great! Man, you shouldn't stop on this! Oh, I can feel here atmosphere of Murakami's worlds... Keep on this!

And soundtrack is good!

[rumesto]

It's great! Man, you shouldn't stop on this! Oh, I can feel here atmosphere of Murakami's worlds... Keep on this!

And soundtrack is good!

[Bambolina07]

WOW !!!! I LOVED THAT

[wildberrries]

If you never went to art school, maybe you should consider it. You seem very talented.

[sakuranohana89]

this is adapted after one of his short-stories.i can't remember which though -_-

[friendsofthefruitsof]

yes it is from Yasunari Kawabata's bell cricket, except his characters had definitive features.

[fishyfishy2232]

great author!

[friendsofthefruitsof]

not really, stop kidding yourself.

[montymike]

I love Murakami and found this video after doing a search for him. Nice work. ^_^

[soguhn]

OLDBOY. <3

I absolutely adore the soundtrack. I really liked this too.

[KrispyMike]

I'm so glad that my video has inspired so much ranting. Please continue! Oh, I have recently finished an improved and COMPLETED version of this video. Being deployed, I can't upload it. I'll try to get my girlfriend to do it though. For the record, I love Murakami and my girlfriend hates him. Isn't it funny =) ~M

[friendsofthefruitsof]

your gF must be better read. HAve you read Abe Kobo?

if not you really will like him. He is amazing and very intense.

[KrispyMike]

Actually, my GF is into romance novels and Harry Potter. Haha. I've never read Abe Kobo but I will be more than glad to try him out. Any recommended titles?

 ~M

[friendsofthefruitsof]

yes as wiht good writers it is wise to start on their short stories, BEYOND THE CURVE is amazing and then tru his books Ark Sakura, SECRET RENDEZVOUS and of course his 2 great WOMAN IN THE DUNES and THE BOSX MAN, amazing!

[friendsofthefruitsof]

Folks... It seems that poparanoid has lost the argument. When asking for some credentials and smashing his argument the claims i am threatening and a stalker. I am only sticking to the topiic. he sends me a link including this line, Thomas Mann, himself a master of it, called "higher cribbing." yes it is true but he seems to have skipped the operative word HIGHER. well this idle treat of calling the winner a stalker is what i expect from the weenie mentality of adequatitude!

[popipopid]

try googling jonathan lethem "the ecstasy of influence."

but i stand by my earlier statement that hard-boiled wonderland was a unique work (as was wind-up bird chronicle).

and now that i've impressed myself by stooping to your level of sarcasm and personal nastiness, i will be bowing out of this "discussion." cheers.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

I initiated this whole response to let others know where the mental midget Murakami swiped his tom robbinsque idears from. Secondly once Abe and Kawabata and Tanizaki and Mishima are read Murakami falls rather flat, so i was offering some grown-up literature to the mix and once you pass the age of 30ish you might see that just because you like something does not mean it is fabulous! Murakami is disingenuous, it is that simple.

[popipopid]

or you could try some serious writers like foucault, deleuze, and guattari; they might explain to you the weaknesses of slavishly sticking to narrow, pre-ordained categories of source material for your intellectual growth. try The Order of Things, or Capitalism and Schizophrenia. Don't hurt yourselves, though. Take it slowly. Read small paragraphs at a time and take lots of breaks.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

you did not answer where exactly are you a masters student? Citing a dismissal of hierarchy is the retreat of a hack! your arguments return back to taste not objective instances. Did you read the BELL CRICKET? (Kawabata) And find where this story was lifted?

[popipopid]

chin up, boys, one day he'll stop jogging and start smoking and drinking; then you can consider him a serious writer. i suggest you drink more and talk less, you'll get further as intellectuals.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

before you knock it have you read Blooms western cannon? have you sat in on his class? and BTW Foucault is a lightweight too, it figures.

[thrilledproductions]

I'm like two moves away from my yellow belt, so it's safe to say I understand the Japanese psyche. Murakami is the best. He and sushi are my favorite things from Japan. I would love to combine them, but sushi is expensive. I got some for my birthday last year, but that was three hours from my home, so I couldn't access my books. My favorite combination would be a spicy tuna with Wind-Up Bird and a spider roll with...let me decide and I will write back. Hold on...

[zenetnaga]

He is just confessing about his emptiness and inability of observing others. (and who cares?) This fuck, posting "100% perfect girl" on others, is sinful. Because.. First, it's too boring as a literature. Second, it agitates people to have an illusion that kind of fuck connects themselves with others. I just hope that you don't incur narrow your lives by learning his rough perspective, critical lack of attention to things and confusion between fuck and connecting with people.

[zenetnaga]

I think you guys are wasting your time. Personally I think he doesn't deserve even to discuss. I just ignore him as one of other empty writers.

The most interesting part of this argument is, you might think that you are talking about Murakami or objecting to others, you are just talking about yourself. I can see the mentality of Murakami here, fucking others roughly not paying attention to individual and differences by describing "100% perfect girl"

[popipopid]

*sigh*

sorry, the holy canon

[moloko36]

you really ought to try reading a serious writer like Oe Kenzaburo`s TEACH US TO OUTGROW OUR MADNESS or some of Abe`s work to see that murakami is nothing more than a VW beetle with a porsche shell.

[popipopid]

you (both) really ought to try reading what you're responding to: as a masters student in the literature of several languages, i read plenty of what the self-important intellects of society call "serious literature." and my other previous statement was that i did not CARE what was considered part of the holy canon, what matters to me is what a piece of literature (or any art) does to influence positive change in my life.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

master's student? where? murakami is only entertainment and cannot be attributed the title of artist. Some writers are not appreciated by their cultures like Abe (one worth a read), but other writers are quite disingenuous with their readers and ought to be exposed for their shenanigans. Murakami is one of them. Again when words like greatest are bandied about then it is time to alert those with such claims that his ideas are lifted and rather thin.

[popipopid]

both of you seem offended by the fact that people appreciate his work--this is a signal of your own inflated sense of self-importance, that you can't stand for others to have their own opinions on greatness. it's one thing to discuss the ideas offered in a piece of literature, it's another to make your whole point nothing more than "all the people that count--me being one--recognize that this author is not serious, and therefore if you read him, you are an idiot."

[zenetnaga]

As far as I know, though I'm a Japanese living in Tokyo, it's a kind of true that people tend to be embarrassed to confess that they like Murakami Haruki. It was stereotypical course that people read Murakami after graduating from Manga and hide the past reading Murakami before. If you say you still like Murakami Haruki, you would be considered that you didn't read other writers or failed to update yourself after Manga. I think it's an objective situation in Japan.

[popipopid]

i've never read any manga, but i think it's sad to be embarrassed about what you like.

[popipopid]

thanks again for the video, i hope to see more!

[popipopid]

sorry--that whole thing is based on the idea that the End of the World is the symbolic structure guiding the narrator's actions in the outside world.

[popipopid]

also, thanks for the video! nice work!

[tmwilson06]

I love that story... Id love to see it finished... the end almost got a tear out of me... :(

[sesshomarusecretlove]

love it! please do more!

[friendsofthefruitsof]

well if he was not such a manipulating copyist he could almost reach the level of a good writer. Sorry but his stories are pilfered from Yasunari Kawabata and Kobo Abe and he cant hold a candle to them

[popipopid]

oh, no! hardboiled wonderland is a book which has never been written! read it again, and think this time; it requires a paradigm shift. it's not just "like a dream," which people keep saying.

[popipopid]

(these 2 are replies to friendsof...) you can read murakami and see a way to change the mess, all i get from kobo abe is the feeling of being sucked further into it.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

do tell do tell...

[popipopid]

do tell what?

how he suggests we could change the mess we're in?

are you being sarcastic, or offering the opportunity for discussion? pls respond.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

a little of both, have you read KAabata's bell cricket from which this story is lifted?

[KrispyMike]

I'm sorry, I never heard of it. You can tell me more if you like. ~M

[friendsofthefruitsof]

Yasunari Kawabata , a great Nobelist-1968 Wrote an amazingly similar story well before Murakami was thinking about writing. He wrote a large volume of books and they are highly worth reading. Mrakami can be praised for opening the door to JApanese Literature, but come in. he is a beginner's writer.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

I recommend to begin the heavy hitting writers with books of their short stories. it familiarizes you with their motiefs, language and tricks. Abe Kobo's is Beyond the curve a wild and terrifying assortment of 6 intense stories. In one- the flood the people shut out of the Ark turn to water. Also read a few JApanese fairytale books as they will clue you into a bit of the background.

[popipopid]

i will look at these closely so i can respond (though it will take some time bc of where i am right now). i have to say, though, that i don't consider murakami to be a beginner's writer. the way he ties images to the ideas he's expressing is both artful and complex. for me, he opened up many things and the ideas in his books continue to unfold their meaning well after i have finished them. it's not just a matter of *japanese* literature, his work stands on it own.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

he cheaply manipulates the reader, It is pretty well agreed he is a light weight. It is a a nice read kind of like Isabelle Allende, but they fall very flat very quickly. I find the categories to be a lot misleading, but the sources of JApanese literature are long and run very deep. Murakami is kinda like those riddles: an elephant & curator disappears where did it go? it is fiction never existed did not go anywhere...

[popipopid]

i guess we just disagree. there's nothing i can say to "it is pretty well agreed he is a light weight." it's a general statement that means nothing. actually, it feels like a cheap manipulation?

[popipopid]

no, i haven't. are you recommending it?

[popipopid]

i think he suggests that our problems stem from a sense of isolation. hardboiled wonderland equated the "it's none of my business" attitude with the End of the World, and showed how we've limited ourselves to task-oriented interactions--like the difference btwn visiting prostitutes (physical contact = duty) and developing a relationship with the librarian, a relationship based on interactions completely outside of duty (for ex, she brings the books to his house, he gets her ice cream).

[popipopid]

and in the end, instead of focusing on himself and what would be most comfortable (returning to the familiar) for him, he goes back to help the girl, something strictly forbidden in that place (which is sort of the logical extension/ extreme form of the rules governing our society now). this is a change in his core-consciousness, and the beginning of the dismantling of the End of the World system. it's a more true escape than just running away.

[popipopid]

so instead of wallowing in--describing in excess--the misery of the current lonely human condition, murakami shows how simple it is to come out of it (even if it does cost a little discomfort, ie the experience of reading the skull, or the fear of not knowing what will come of breaking the rules, etc.). or atleast how possible it is.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

Abe Kobo- the protagonist in Woman in the Dunes finds his freedom to escape and then he does not wallow in it, but is able to leave because he has found hope. He is mired in the same sort of social constraints from which there seems no escape, but his water device breaks him out of the treachery, and then he is able to chose his position.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

yes by reading generic tripe, marrying an average person and accepting your hopeless situation and going on with life with no real aim and not fighting your situation or trying to do better. THAt is a cheery prospect. so continue on with your little writer and becareful if you bandy words like greatest writer. That is my issue here not that he exists, but that people think he is great, the promotion of mediocrity only leads to a downward spiral.

[popipopid]

i like murakami because he suggests NOT accepting a hopeless situation. i find him much more positive, inspiring, and creative than many of the people i read as a masters student in english, spanish, and arabic literature. i'm a born fighter, which is why i've wasted so much time with you, and why i'm unfazed by someone telling me that something i think is great is mediocre. and i married someone amazing.

[friendsofthefruitsof]

then you disagree with him. Murakami says mediocrity is good enough so shoganai!

[popipopid]

i'd have problems taking your word for anything, as you can't even read these little blips carefully enough to respond to them directly (or even in a way that makes sense). there doesn't seem to be any point to this? bye.

[moloko36]

you are mistaken. I am Japanese and he is not considered serious. We dont buy his "exotic" bullshit. sigh he is not part of the Canon of Japnaese literature, I read Fruit`s comments and they are basically correct. it is known that Murakami steals others stories.

[popipopid]

and third, i'm not considering murakami's "japaneseness," or whether the current generation of japanese readers considers him to be a serious writer (and it seems to me that artists who create real change in their fields are usually recognized LAST by their contemporaries in academia); i feel his work stands on its own.

[popipopid]

it's like discussing a movie, and never getting past which actors are big-time and which one wore unfashionable shoes. if you don't like his work, and you don't have any openness to a discussion about the positive aspects of it, then spend your time appreciating what you DO appreciate and leave the rest of us to like what we like!

[friendsofthefruitsof]

no you are mistaken this is like discussing whether the plot of a film is it valid or a pastiche of others ideas and a weakened set of cliches strung together with the ulterior message be happy with you r banal life because a little happiness is good enough. Dont worry about VAlues- your schtick too, just acccept things. Where exactly are you a master's student?

[popipopid]

and listen, you're not the standard-bearer for words like "great." if something speaks to me, i respond accordingly, and i don't ask for permission from the guards of the holy cannon.

[ambersumiko]

Was this story published in the New Yorker? I've read some of them, but haven't come across this one yet! Thanks, it's great!

[iwtbfy]

This is pretty cool, I'd like to see some more of it, with either this story or some other Murakami stuff.

[nyerro]

Wow, Haruki Murakami + OldBoy "clarinet" soundtrack. It sounds very well :) Congratulations, good work! Arigato!

[DrTatsuya]

truly amazing.love it.please do the same with norwegian wood :))

[tarakoba]

nice work!

[Dyemonde]

YO Mike, nice sketch, i especially like the timing between the words and the music, keep it up, and yes, Murakami.

[Keats84]

this is pretty awesome Mike.

[noroelle1606]

that is so lovely! i am really impressed by that work. murakami is my favourite author. did you make more of that kind of artwork?

[KrispyMike]

No, I haven't made any more but I do intend to sooner or later. Hopefully I'll have the time, US Army does take up a lot of time... pointlessly

[typhoonia]

could someone tell me what that song is...i think it sounds like something from a hayao miyazaki movie..but not sure

[KrispyMike]

I believe the song is called "The Last Waltz" from "OldBoy" the movie original soundtrack. I got it off of limewire.

[typhoonia]

cheers... oldboy..i knew i recognized it from something!!

[xareezx]

i like it. i've read 6 of his books and some short stories. i love his work.

[HardcoreBunny81]

surprisingly i liked it. just finishing reading The Wind Up Bird Chronicle, if you have a spare week or so you could adapt that! Good work

[sprawlinggreen]

Nice. Good work.