Liar x Liar: A Gyaru Romance, With a Side of Step-Siblings

 An entirely preposterous and yet highly entertaining movie, Liar x Liar tells the story of a girl named Minato (Nana Mori) whose life gets turned upside down when her stepbrother Toru (Hokuto Matsumura) falls for her when she’s masquerading in gyaru outfit/makeup. 

An improbable tale buoyed by the adorable acting of actress Nana Mori, wonderfully transforming herself from the reserved and bookish girl into a vibrant and outgoing juvie gal, taking what should be an icky situation into something inspired!

Minato is a college student who has the unfortunate luck of being the stepsister to the most popular guy in school, being picked on by jealous girls who see her as a threat, as well as having to deal with his aloof behavior at home.

But things take a turn one day when she is out helping her Photographer friend Maki (Mayu Hotta) as a model for a photo shoot, dressing in a yankee style outfit complete with clothing, makeup and wig!

She accidentally bumps into her stepbrother and, mortified at being caught in such an outfit, pretends to be someone else! Not only does the ruse work, but the womanizing brother even offers to take her out and gives her his number!!!

Later that day Maki and Minato have a good laugh over the clueless stepbrother, and after another aggravating evening dealing with her brother’s arrogant attitude, Minato decides to use his ignorance to teach him a lesson!

Minato’s plan is this: to actually go on dates with her brother incognito, make him fall for her, and then, when he has fallen for her completely, dump him like a hot potato! And at first, it seems like her scheming may actually be working!

Bt of course things don’t work out the way she plans. besides having to deal with her real budding romance with a childhood cram-school friend (Yuta Koseki), the confused Minato may actually be falling in love with her brother herself!!!

With wig in tow, Liar x Liar reminded me not just a little of the fun drama “Himitsu No Ai-Chan”, showing that just a little makeup and wig can disguise anyone beyond recognition more than the old glasses/no-glasses trope of old!

Tellin' ya, with every show I see her in, Nana Mori is becoming more and more a BIG favorite of mine!!! Such a cutie and always so believable in her roles- however IMPOSSIBLE they may be!!! LOL!

PS: In another reminder that we are all getting on, Minato’s mother is played by Shoko Aida of iconic 90's pop duo Wink, showing us that even the adorable idols of yesteryear eventually grow up!

Posted by zdorama @ zdoramaagain.blogspot.com

Taking Flight With Wink!

My Recent Acquisition!!!!

As some of you may know, Pony Canyon idol group CoCo was my gateway drug into J-pop, introduced to me by my good friend Dan-O, and while the girls were our main points of infatuation, there were a few other groups he liked and introduced me to, among them Judy and Mary. Lindberg, and the girl duo WINK.

He had this one particular album from them called “Voce” which I simply fell in love with and was one of the very first non-CoCo J-pop CDS I ever picked up.

He also had a laserdisc video collection which introduced me to a few other songs (predominantly from their album “Overture” though I wouldn’t realize it til later) like Twinkle Twinkle and the awesome “Itsumodemo Suki De”, which became one of my favorite J-pop singles ever!

Meanwhile Dan-O had moved back home to Guam, and sent me copies of some of their other albums, Queen Of Love, Nocturne and Wink Remixes(!) 

Well, having spent the last year getting into Yu Hayami’s body of work (and body) and finding it very rewarding, I was hungry to start listening to some new (old) music, and my mind came back to WINK.

Wink! YES, NOW was the time, and I was pretty thrilled to finally seriously dive into their music, and, along with the albums Dan copied for me, J-Pop site JPOP80SS helped fill out my playlists so could begin my adventure into Winkdom!

From the FIRST album Moonlight Serenade, I was completely enthralled by the music I was hearing- COOL, catchy, GROOVY and smooth, Shoko Aida and Sachiko Suzuki’s music was, as the young’uns say nowadays, “A BOP!”

Especially for You, Twin Memories, Aphrodita, Nocturne, Overture, EACH of their albums blew me away, and I knew I wouldn’t be satisfied until I got ahold of their physical CDS as well!

Come to find out, Older J-Pop CDs from the 80s is getting harder and harder to find- I’ve bene having a HECK of a time trying to get copies of CDs from acts like Iyo Matsumoto and Yukiko Okada, and WINK seemed to be no exception!

But then I came across a seller auctioning a goldmine: Seems a couple of years ago, WINK celebrated their 30th Anniversary my releasing their catalog remastered on the UHQCD format (the same format I used to complete my Yukiko Okada collection), and this dealer had practically their whole output!

As each CD was about 33 bucks USD, I had to make some hard choices of which ones to get, but in the end with the exception of“At Heels Diamond” which was an EP of American covers and which I didn’t much care for ), I bought ‘em ALL!

Sadly, the only CD the dealer was missing, having already sold it weeks ago, was Wink’s FIRST album Moonlight Serenade. A real bummer since it's one of my faves! Still, it was QUITE a catch to get 13 of their releases in one crack*, and I blessed my good luck!

There was  bit of a worry because I was to find that, thanks to the COVID19 restrictions, most dealers out of Japan had suspended their overseas deliveries and no orders were being processed! ARGH.

After an agonizing week of no contact from the sellers, I then sent a sad message telling them that if they couldn’t ship it then they could cancel the order. Waited another hang-wringing week without response til JUST a few days ago the seller contacted me, telling me my order was being sent via DHL and should arrive any day!

HALLELUJAH!

Well, JUST today the package arrive, and as you can see, they are as BEAUTIFUL as could be!  Not only do I NOW have these wonderful albums and songs on hard disc, but have  the color covers, booklets and pictures that go with it as well!! 

A WONDERFUL addition to my Humble J-Pop collection!

PS:

I think I mentioned before that I love to listen to my music while taking long walks in parks where I’d catch the sunset an then head off to grab dinner….

There was this one particular park I always loved walking through while listening to Wink, and on the back of their album “Overture”, the girls were in a park that looked SO MUCH like the park I took my walks in!!

Overture Back Cover:

 My Park:

OK, maybe not an EXACT match, but definitely the same aura! Seems Wink Music was just MADE for my constitutionals!

*Yes, I even bought Voce since it was the remastered UHQCD version! Since it was my very first wink CD, I just HAD to have it int he BEST quality I could get it!

The Sexy Side of Sachiko Suzuki

J-pop duo Wink were among the very first artists I learned when I first got into Japanese music, and even then I think I had a thing for Sachiko Suzuki whom captivated me from the start!

Whenever I would blog about my favorite songs from Wink, I would always put a little caveat about how much I dug Sachiko Suzuki, and when I found out that after Wink  had run its course she had begun releasing  photobooks and gravure movies, I knew I just HAD to get my hands on some of them! But it was harder to acquire than I thought.

When I FINALLY got to watch it, I could see why all the clips floating around on the internet were so bad...the actual video ITSELF was shot in this muddy, darkly contrasty and PURPOSEFULLY BLURRY style, making the entire movie seem like a low-budget arty-farty flick...(which, in some ways, I suppose it was.)

Stil we got to see Sachiko in her absolute sexiest: From bikinis to Bra and panties, and even a touch of S&M!

VERY captivating stuff!!!