I love you and your basset hound Mamoru Oshii and I have for years…..

These are the blogs I have done about the Japanese writer and director over the years.

2/24/09 – Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence

6/8/09 – Website stats explode on Sunday

10/20/09 – For my anime friends…Gabriel Oshii and his Father haunt Hollywood

Now Mamoru Oshii has made an animated short film, about 13 minutes long, staring his basset hound, whom I am assuming is still Gabriel. Looks like Gabriel anyway.

I loved it. It appears to me that Gabriel is dreaming. In his dream he perhaps saves the world unknowingly with his tennis ball? Anyway, that’s my take on it. I would love to know what it really means. I have watched Mamoru Oshii animation for years and I am just not a huge SiFi fan but I am a huge fan of his art and his love for basset hounds.

Enjoy….

Article on the internet….

“That Ghost In The Shell director Mamoru Oshii has a thing for basset hounds is not exactly news for fans. The man has been tucking the sad eyed, droopy eared dogs into his work – both live action and animation – for decades now and it’s been suggested more than once that the director has more affection for his canine friends than any bipeds on the planet. So the fact that recent animated short film
Je T’Aime features a basset hound as the lead isn’t really a surprise. If anything the surprise is that it’s taken this long for a hound to take the lead.

Je T’Aime had a brief festival run before being released as part of a DVD package for Japanese pop stars Glay.”

See them on the billboard in the background? Love it…

More blogging about Mamoru and Gabriel later….Love, Cat, Chaps and Emma

KITCHENER Charles (Chuck) Greb of shoe- and boot-maker Greb Industries in Kitchener, has died.

As national sales director of the company, Chuck Greb was the man who found Velvet, the basset hound that became emblematic of the company’s Hush Puppies brand in the 1960s. Kodiak was another well-known Greb label.

Waterloo, Ontario – Friday Dec 5, 2008 – Chuck Greb stands in front of a photo of Jasmine and Velvet, basset hounds he owned in the early 1970s. Violet (right) was a mascot for the Hush Puppies shoes produced by Greb Industries, a company founded by his grandfather. Philip Walker, Record staff

At its peak in the early 1970s, Greb Industries operated seven plants in North America, and had 2,200 people on its payroll. The family sold the company in 1974. The last local plant closed in 1990.

Nearing 80, Greb teamed up with a retired journalist to publish The Greb Story, an account of the family’s 64 years with one of the city’s legacy industries.The name and symbol came from Wolverine’s marketing department, but Greb brought the concept alive with a real basset hound named Velvet, and a small sidekick, Jasmine.

The dogs lived the life of Riley.

“Velvet traveled with me wherever I went,” Greb says. “She stayed in the finest hotels.”

In 1973, Velvet and Jasmine disappeared, unleashing international media attention and public outrage. Jasmine’s body was eventually found at the bottom of a silo. Velvet was never found.

“I think some kids probably did it,” Greb says.

The following year, the family sold the business.

End of article….

I would really like to read more of this man’s story and how he found Velvet. Howl fasinating.

RIP Mr. Greb, you will be missed

More finding out about Velvet later….Love, Cat, Chaps and Emma

I found this article on line today and found it very interesting.

From James Cameron to the Wachowski brothers to Steven Spielberg, US film-makers are paying homage to a groundbreaking Japanese anime the movie that gave us today’s vision of cyberspace.

When Larry and Andy Wachowski were pitching The Matrix to their producers, they played them a DVD of an 82-minute Japanese cartoon and said: “We wanna do that for real.” The film was 1995’s Ghost in the Shell, which defined a visual identity for cyberpunk cinema and counts James Cameron and Steven Spielberg among its most high-profile fans.

As it turned out, The Matrix wasn’t quite Ghost in the Shell “for real”, but it is indebted to it. Both films explore the virtual realm with a combination of existential questioning and kick-ass violence. The Wachowskis borrowed many of Ghost’s key details, including the digital “rain” of green numbers that signifies cyberspace, and the way humans plug themselves in through holes in the backs of their necks.

While he has just rereleased a “2.0″ refurbishment of his 15-year-old film, director Mamoru Oshii is modest about its pioneering qualities. “I did not revise it because I was dissatisfied with the original, but to prove how far we have progressed since then,” he explains. A cheerfully taciturn man with a penchant for basset hounds, Oshii doesn’t like to talk about the Matrix and any similarities to his film.

“I’ve been asked this question hundreds of times. Frankly, it gets a bit annoying. I’m sure the Wachowski brothers feel the same. It is an entertaining movie, but I prefer their debut, Bound.”

Adapted from a comic book written by Masamune Shirow, Ghost in the Shell possesses many hallmarks of the anime (Japanese animation) genre: vast metropolises, lovingly detailed robots, military hardware, pneumatic women with huge eyes. The story is a future-noir thriller along the lines of Bladerunner, following a female cyborg detective on the trail of a mysterious hacker. She also questions her own identity: does she possess a “ghost” or a soul? Is she just a machine?

Surprisingly, the film was co-financed by a British company, Manga Films, an offshoot of Island records. Andy Frain, the movie’s executive producer, says: “I wanted to do a blend of east and west: western storytelling combined with Japanese artistry and a great soundtrack we were talking to Massive Attack at one point.” But his suggestions were largely ignored, he says. The critics were lukewarm, and the film only reached a sizeable audience on video and DVD.

But it did appeal to an influential contingent of film-makers. James Cameron has described Ghost in the Shell as “a stunning work of speculative fiction . . . the first to reach a level of literary excellence”. (His forthcoming movie Avatar envisages a future in which humans can transfer their personalities into the bodies of an alien species. Sound familiar?)

Ghost in the Shell’s influence on Spielberg, another fan, is clear in AI: Artificial Intelligence, which ponders the philosophical implications of the human-automaton interface, and in the future-tech visions of Minority Report. In April this year, Spielberg’s Dreamworks studio acquired the remake rights to Ghost in the Shell; he plans to make a 3D live-action version.

In the past year, we’ve also had Joss Whedon’s enjoyable TV series Dollhouse, in which secret agents are wiped clean of their memories and personalities, so as to be implanted with new, temporary ones. And the sci-fi film Surrogates, out last month, imagines a future in which people prefer to stay at home and control avatars of themselves in the outside world.

But Ghost in the Shell went further than its Hollywood counterparts. Unlike the replicants in Blade Runner, the techno-slaves of The Matrix or the robot in AI, Ghost’s cyborg heroine does not seek to regain her “lost” humanity. Without giving away the ending, the film hints at the start of a brave new post-human era (or is it a Buddhist parable?) about the surrender of self into a larger entity. Quite a burden for an 82-minute cartoon.

End of article…….

I wonder if Stephen Spielberg will use a basset hound. He almost has to. I am very interested to follow this one.

More about this topic later….Love, Cat, Chaps and Emma

I will click to the side under sub blogs to see if it works!

Me

Mamoru Oshi, and an eariler blog posting I did about him.

He is HUGE in Japanese animation and he also incorporates his love of his basset hound into his movies. I don’t know if it was a basset hound thing or just a Mamoru Oshi thing, but it was cool none the less! I could not tell, because it was all in a different language.

It was really fantastic because about a thousand extra visitors came to basset hound town yesterday. It was kind of thrilling for me because I love this guy. I have been following him for years. I have sent him e-mails asking to interview him but I have never heard back.

I hope that someday I can met him and his hound, GABE, in cyberspace. The first e-mail I sent him was back in 2006. That’s OK, I am very patient!

I Love, cool stuff like this!

More Japanese animation later, Love……..Cat, Chaps and Emma

I love keeping track of all things basset hounds and I have been wanting to do a sub blog category on famous basset hounds for a long time. I know all of our basset hounds are famous in their own right but his sub blog is some what different. I want to do features on bassets like, Boswell, Cleo, Hugo (Marilyn Monroe’s basset), bassets in movies and more. By more I mean basset hound that are heroes and sometimes touch us even more than the hounds in print or in the movies.

I thought it would be fun and touching! So, my graphic designer and I worked on a new header for this sub blog today. It is not up yet. There will be some fun flash details attached to it. I thought you might like to see it before it goes up as a header.

If you are wondering???????? Chaps and Emma will most likely wind up in this category at some point, but not now. They are not “famous” enough yet! Who knows what famous means? I have some pretty obscure stuff in my pocket.

I will look at published authors who showcase basset hound and movies that show our dear breed. It will be fun. I actually think Lily and Chloe qualify but they will be down on the list. I am pretty sure I will start with Boswell. He is my favorite famous basset!

It will be fun and I hope many of you will send in some famous hounds. Famous is all in a word. Do you have a story?

More famous stories later………Love, Cat, Chaps and Emma

This is going to be a very long and interesting post about someone I really admire. I have been wanting to blog about this person for a long time.

I have followed Mamoru Oshii’s career as a writer and director since 1995 when he released his cyber punk animated film, Ghost in the Shell.

Why you ask? It’s very, very simple – Mamoru has a basset hound named
Gabriel (ガブリエル). Gabriel became the feature of his 2004 film, Innocence.

Mamoru Oshii

I have tried for years to get an interview with Mamoru Oshii. I had hoped to ask him more about his beloved Gabriel and perhaps even get some pictures. I have not given up hope yet!

Here are parts of an interview he did give to Judit Kawaguchi that might show you why I am so intrigued by him.

INTERVIEW WITH MAMORU OSHII – 3-13-07

Tools of the trade deserve respect. Everything has a spirit, and we Japanese sense it, whether it is in a mountain, a doll or a kitchen knife. Therefore, we usually give names to our tools; we treat them as partners. Once they are broken, we make elaborate ceremonies to thank them for their service and hard work. For example, we place old needles in tofu, and we pay our respects to them in a Shinto ceremony called harikuyo- (literally “mourning needles”). I named my first NEC computer Basset 68,000 and I still keep its brain, its hard disk, in a drawer. I can never throw it away.

Women run Japan and not in the right direction. Japanese wives boss their husbands around, and the smartest way to deal with these overpowering women is to give in to them. At home, I behave just like a dog: I show my appreciation to my wife and always apologize in advance, even if I have done nothing wrong. Of course, she gets mad anyhow, so it is best to stay at work. I think this is universal, though: Men are struggling and losing out to stronger women, but I find many foreign women a lot gentler than their Japanese counterparts.

Dogs have instincts, and it’s wise to follow them.I adore my two dogs, Daniel and Gabriel, and I listen to them; if they like someone, he or she is definitely a good person.

Animals need more protection. My dream is to set up an animal rescue force, similar to those that exist in other countries, where the officials not only help animals but have the authority to arrest those who hurt them.

Those who torture animals deserve severe punishment. I feel like giving them all the death penalty because it’s the worst kind of crime, and I rather suspect that such predators usually move on to children next. Also, if a man hurts a woman, he should get a life sentence.

Pamper those you love while you can. Atami, in Shizuoka Prefecture, has the best climate for my dogs, so I moved there. We walk the mountains, take onsen (hot spring) baths together and enjoy the good life. They eat better food than me. I get soba noodles and they chew on veggies, meat and rice. They deserve it!

One can never be the same after losing a loved one. I’m in constant fear about the inevitable death of my two dogs, Gabriel, 13, and Daniel, who is maybe 16 now. I’ll never be the same without them. Even now, I have a big hole in my heart for my cat, which died years ago.

Little white lies make people happy. I love people and I often resort to telling them what they want to hear. When I say such things, I even believe it myself.

END OF INTERVIEW

Today I saw on the internet wires that Mamoru’s Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence, is being released on DVD.

The year is 2032. With the advancement of medical technology humanity has grown into a more technologically driven creature, creating a breed of cyborg citizen. Along with the development of cybernetics the world has seen rapid development in the field of artificial intelligence, making androids a commercially viable venture. A recent string of murders perpetrated by a prototype female android has drawn the attention of Section 9, a unit specializing in counter cyberterrorism. With none of the victims families pressing charges, suspicions arise regarding the nature of the androids and their production.
Months have passed since the end of the Puppet Master incident, and with the Major still missing, investigative duties fall to her cyborg commando partner Batou and his newly recruited biological partner, Togusa. Can the two overcome their differences and discover the truth behind the string of murders?

For the most part the films are very hard to understand. Experts on Mamoru’s work watch each film over and over to gain enough knowledge to write a review. Mamoru’s films have to be viewed in order and each film has to be viewed several times.

Also, you have to be into Japanese animation. I have seen several of his films and I will buy this one. I love having the collection and supporting Mamoru in his passion. I will also buy the soundtrack. How cool is that cover? The basset hound standing over the injured robot/cyborg thing? From what I understand, the basset serves as a guadian angel to the cyborg. Maybe that is why Mamoru’s basset is named Gabriel. I better write down that question and keep it when I get to interview him.

Here is another interesting shot of the basset hound that appears in GIS2.

American Justin Leach (right) lived in Japan and worked for Production I.G. for almost three years. Among the projects Justin worked on was the basset hound in Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence. Photo credit: Kazunori Suga. All GITS2 images courtesy of Go Fish Pictures.

One more picture. Here is the basset hound under construction.

Mar. 3, 2003 – Justin Leach
Right now, I am compositing a shot with a 3D basset hound. This particular shot is a little tricky because the render times are quite long. At high-resolution, high quality, it takes about 13 minutes a frame, which means in order to finish 10 seconds of animation, it takes about two days of continuous rendering. Here is the shot in it’s completed form. Look for it in the YouTube video clip I found at the end of this blog.

Let’s end with another interview I found on line:

Interviewer: You’ve been credited as a major influence on contemporary animators. Is there anything in particular you’d like them to learn from you?

MO: I would recommend that they not go into animation. It won’t do them any good.

Interviewer: Why is that?

MO: You won’t make money, it’s hard, and you’ll lose all your friends.

Interviewr: And yet you’re still an animator.

MO: Well, I don’t care whether I have any friends.

I think I could have turned in a term paper for college on the subject of Japanation of a basset hound. LOL

I really enjoyed looking at a lot of this information on the net. I hope you enjoyed it as well.

Mamoru Oshii, if you are out there I am a fan. I would love to see some pictures of your precious Gabriel.

More about Gabriel Mamoru Oshii later….Love, Cat, Chaps and Emma