Okada Masaki Monogatari

Yoritomo (Okada Masaki) in full battle armour, ep 46 Starting in May 1180, episode 46 of ‘Taira no Kiyomori’ opened with another Genji/Yoritomo scene, following what happened in ep 45 where Yoritomo received a letter from Prince Mochihito requesting his help. Yoritomo still hesitated a bit. It took H ōj ō Masako (Watanabe Anne) sternly reminding him of his life's purpose,  as well as the support from T ō Kuro (Tsukamoto Takashi) and H ōj ō Tokimasa ( End ō Kenichi) before Yoritomo was convinced o f his chance to win a war against Kiyomori . The letter-deliverer (whoever he was) also said that Minamoto no Yorimasa 100% supported Yoritomo. Finally, Yoritomo nodded, and thus began the Genpei War . Click here for the online version of ep 46. Below is the summary of TNK 46 from NHK World Premium ( click this for the longer summary in Japanese) . Learning Prince Mochihito's plot, Kiyomori bursts in anger and captures Mochihito and his followers. While Kiyomori enforc...

Okada Masaki (forgot where I got this from...) Below is my translation of the article in Cinema Today Japan on 18 November 2012. I used Google Translator for word-to-word meaning and common sense (a huge dose of it) for general meaning to understand the article, so please forgive me for the (many many) mistakes I surely make... Okada Masaki could not play Yoritomo without Anne Okada Masaki (the narrator of the currently-airing Taiga Drama ‘Taira no Kiyomori’ and the actor who portrayed the Genji leader Minamoto no Yoritomo) talked about his perception of an ideal couple. The captivating series that shows a distinctive rendition of the life of Taira no Kiyomori is coming to an end. The story will now focus on Yoritomo raising an army and the destruction of the Taira . Okada, who was responsible for the narration from the first episode, said that he was totally taken by the Heike’s strength. “I think this is the story of a strong person. I think a person like that will ...

Yoritomo (Okada Masaki) reading the request letter from Mochihito, ep 45 Taira no Kiyomori ep 45 started in spring 1180 where Kiyomori’s power grew significantly in Kyoto. His wise son Shigemori had died ( ep 44 ), thus the power that kept the delicate balance between the Court and the Heike has diminished to almost nothing. Go-Shirakawa was put into house-arrest during last week’s episode, so we don’t have any Matsuda Shota scene for you Shota fans :-( Click here for ep 45. This is the NHK summary for ep 45: Kiyomori launches a coup d'etat by placing the cloistered Emperor Go-Shirakawa under confinement, and finally becomes the first samurai to seize control over the entire country. While Kiyomori manipulates the Imperial Court freely from Fukuhara, Prince Mochihito (Go-Shirakawa's son), who has been put in a miserable situation by Kiyomori, devises a plot to take up arms against the Taira family. Yoshitsune, the son of Yoshitomo and Tokiwa, is also gaining stre...

Yoritomo (Okada Masaki) and his daughter O-hime   (kinda reminds me of Masaki's role in 'Himitsu no Akko-chan'!) TNK this week (1179 CE) was opened with Minamoto no Yoritomo (Okada Masaki) and Hōjō Masako (Watanabe Anne) enjoying the presence of their first offpring, baby O-hime. At the background, father -in-law Hōjō Tokimasa was getting worried that he would be the receiving end of Kiyomori's wrath should the R okuhara lord heard of this new s. It seems that Tokimasa had also heard of rumours about the impending end of the Heike's reign in Kyoto. Yoritomo and Masako seemed to be blissfully ignorant of these subject s, at least for the moment . Baby O-hime seemed to be a healthy girl (which – alas – was not the way she would grow up; I think she would have some mental illness of sort). Somehow, I think Yoritomo was still being left alone with Masako (without the Heike getting pissed off about the marriage) because Kiyomori was busy balancing his powe...

Shana ō (Kamiki Ry u nosuke) became Yoshitsune, ep 43 TNK ep 43 opened this week with Narichika asking Shigemori to beg Kiyomori to spare his life in the aftermath of the Shishigatani Incident last week. We also have Lady Tokiwa for the first time after more than 10 episodes, as well as Shanaō and Benkei, plus Yoritomo and Masako (of course!). Regulars like Kiyomori himself and the two-faced Go-Shirakawa were always there. Someone got sick, and someone would die in ep 44. Below is the NHK summary : Narichika, who has been exiled by Kiyomori, dies from starvation. Shigemori becomes worn down by the passing of his brother-in-law and from the considerations shown for the cloistered Emperor Go-Shirakawa. Around the same time, Kiyomori learns of Tokuko’s pregnancy and prays for the safe delivery of the baby. Tokuko finally gives birth to a boy, the son of Emperor Takakura, who later becomes known as Emperor Antoku . In izu, Yoritomo and Masako are trying to get permission for the...

The book cover by Wenart Gunadi Thanks to an anonymous commentator almost two weeks ago, I’ve read Yoshikawa Eiji’s book (or Eiji Yoshikawa to Western readers) titled ‘Minamoto no Yoritomo’. Yoshikawa sensei was the author of some masterpieces, including ‘Musashi’ and ‘Taiko’. I read the Indonesian version of ‘Minamoto no Yoritomo’ (no English translation so far); the translation was quite well done.  Obtaining the book was an adventure of its own too. The book was apparently published in May this year, when I didn’t even know about (and fell in love with) Okada Masaki (the actor who played Minamoto no Yoritomo in NHK’s 2012 ‘Taira no Kiyomori’). Hence, the book completely escaped my radar, despite me having read Musashi cover-to-cover twice, once in Indonesian and the next one in English. To make it more dramatic, the only bookshop in Denpasar that sold it was about 45 min drive with motorbike, into the most polluted, convoluted and jammed region in Kuta (and hence,...