Talk:Benshi

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An entry from Benshi appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page in the Did you know? column on 24 January 2006.

[edit] Clarify please

Ok, I'm going to sound stupid, but I think this an important point to add -- how does a person "narrate" a silent film? Miming? Hand-signals? Lip-reading? Holding up title cards? I think, for the dim (like me), what acts the benshi performed need to be clarified. Thanks, Xoloz 18:40, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

Good Point. They were live performers, and performed much like actors in a play. - AKeen 18:51, 24 January 2006 (UTC)

I love Japanese silent film and have never come across a '20s film with sound. Never even *read* about one. Please provide a source for that statement. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Nagaeyari (talk • contribs)

Please sign your comments (append ~~~~ to them.) What statement are you talking about? The one which notes that the Japanese silent film era lasted into the 30s merely states that films were made with sound in the 20s, which is certainly true. --Kundor 12:04, 18 November 2006 (UTC)

the perceived lack of films might be due to a few factors: #1 the popularity of the benshi (which you can verify in any text on the film history of Japan) and #2 the 1923 earthquake in Tokyo/Yokohama, which devastated the Japanese film industry, and #3 the firebombing campaign of 1945, which destroyed many films. These last two causes resulted in the loss of the bulk of Japanese films made before the war. brain 23:14, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] ISBN 10 vs 13

There are two ISBN's for one of the books. Since the citation template only accepts one, I only put in one. Here's both of them:

• ISBN10: 0-7734-6648-7
• ISBN13: 978-0-7734-6648-7

brain 22:41, 21 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Concerning a link I was not permitted to post

I received an automatic response to an attempt to post a link to www.myspace.com/shadoword. I can understand why they would be alerted to links connecting to myspace pages, but the myspace page belongs to shadoWord productions, a new organization devoted to benshi (live narrated) film performances. Anyhow, the automatic response suggested that I raise the issue in the TALK section before attempting to repost. So I welcome any response. Jeremy James Thompson