RSSNonami Takizawa – 3D X Shogeki Furetemite
18 Jan 2010 16 Comments
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Nonami Takizawa – 3D X Shogeki Furetemite (January 7th, 2009)
SOD/Glamorous Candy
Catalog # ISCR3D-1 – All Regions – 16:9 Apect
Running Time: 66 Minutes
Note from JMM: This Guest Review of the new Nonami Takizawa DVD has been written by Mike from Michigan, a long-time reader, and one of Nonami’s biggest fans, stateside or otherwise. I am proud to present his review, and would like to thank him for his generous contributions to JMM’s AoV. Without further preamble, his review follows forthwith.
There are many words that can be used to describe this latest release from Nonami Takizawa, but if I had to choose just one word to sum it up, it would be “exquisite”.
For those of us who have been following Nonami’s career since “Pure Smile” was issued on February 20, 2003, we have seen her mature from a beautiful 17-year-old girl into a stunning 24-year-old woman. She still has much of the youthful charm and exuberance that she had at 17, but she’s now got a sultry, alluring gracefulness that she didn’t posses as a teen.
Okay … let’s get into the meat of this DVD.
First off, this is a two-disc set …
Disc.1 has not one, but two, 3-D versions of the video. I won’t be commenting on these, as I don’t have either of the necessary 3-D glasses required to view this properly. However, I’d be willing to bet that the 3-D is very effective, considering that S.O.D. has really gone all-out for this production.
Disc.2 is the 2-D version, and has nine chapters. It’s this disc that I will be reviewing.
In Chapter One, Nonami opens the door of what I would call an adobe villa wearing an “itsy bitsy teenie weenie yellow polka dot bikini”. She steps out onto the veranda, gives us that devastating smile of hers, and we spend the next twelve minutes watching her run through her repertoire of facial expressions and body movements. (While she’s no Meryl Streep, let’s not forget that she is in fact an actress … and I’d recommend watching some of her movies or TV shows if you ever have the opportunity).
Her beautiful hair is very long now, and she is as fit as I’ve seen her (not-to-worry though … her boobs are still perfectly magnificent!). I really liked the way the production crew used the natural sunlight and shade in this opening chapter, and the soundtrack is a perfect fit for the mood of this scene … as it is throughout the entire disc.
Next comes the first in a series of “easter-eggs”. (If you elect to watch each chapter individually from the disc’s Main Menu, you will not see any of the “easter-eggs” … in order to see these (and they’re all worth watching) you have to select Play All from the Main Menu).
“Easter-egg” number one has Nonami posing provocatively (I assume for a photo-shoot) in red lingerie.
In Chapter Two, Nonami is wearing a see-through turquoise mesh-knit garment over a white bikini. She plays with a hose out on the patio, gets herself suitably wet, and throws her more-than-ample bosom around a bit for us to appreciate. There’s not that much going on here, but the chapter is appropriately short at four minutes.
“Easter-egg” number two: She speaks!! (and it’s the only time on the DVD that she does so).
Chapter Three finds our Japanese-lovely poolside, splashing-about with a couple of inflatables (sorry for the double-entendre … but I just couldn’t resist). She’s wearing a green bikini, and looks jaw-dropping in it. Six minutes of heaven.
“Easter-egg” number three: if you’re enamored of Nonami’s breasts, don’t miss this one.
Back to the veranda for Chapter Four, which clocks-in at hree-and-a-half minutes. Nonami is Miss Baseball in this one — blue shorts, a modestly-revealing, green sleeveless top, and, of course, a baseball cap. She’s very bouncy here, and this scene, with all of the balls being thrown toward the camera, must be very cool in 3-D.
“Easter-egg” number four: Nonami pulling a white see-through garment over her head, leaving her clad in only a charcoal-and-grey bra and thong set. Only a few seconds long, but it left me breathless.
Chapter Five features Ms. Takizawa in-and-around a gently-flowing brook or stream. At the outset, she’s wearing a flimsy print summer dress which she gladly sheds for us. This is a long, slow-paced, serene, sensuous scene, but with a variety of camera shots … full-body, bikini-bottom close-ups, bikini-top close-ups, and facial close-ups. It’s a bit long (10 minutes), but I was not in the least bit bored.
“Easter-egg” number five: Nonami in a hot-tub … in “full-float” mode (if you know what I mean).
“Sexy-Nonami” takes over Chapter Six. Her co-star in this one is a beautifully restored 1965 Ford Mustang convertible. At first, she’s wearing a sleeveless black zippered spandex top, a black thong, and black mesh nylon stockings. Naturally, the zipper gets tested several times.
The second phase of the chapter has our sex-pot in a mainly see-through nylon undergarment, rolling around on the hood of the Mustang.
Lastly, she switches to a gold lame’ monokini, and cavorts around the interior of the classic Ford.
If you like Victoria’s Secret, you’ll love this scene, and in my opinion she looks more alluring and more beautiful than any Victoria’s Secret model ever dreamed of.
“Easter-egg” number six: Nonami being photographed in that gold lame’ monokini.
Kimono-time for Chapter Seven. Only two-and-a-half minutes, but, oh-my-word, is this ever sexy. She drops the kimono off her shoulders and opens the lower part to show us her shapely legs.
“Easter-egg” number seven: Our beauty gives us a preview of the outfit to be worn in the next scene. This seems to be more video of a photo-shoot, just like all of the “easter-eggs” appear to be.
In Chapter Eight (a tad over six minutes) Ms. Takizawa – in a pretty little tan bikini – lightheartedly plays with a rope hung on a tree which is next to the steps leading down from the house. What with all the swinging and such, this must look great in 3-D. Actually, it looks damned fine in 2-D.
The final chapter (which does not appear on Disc.1) has Nonami in an off-the-shoulder crocheted sweater-dress, looking as coquettish as any woman possibly can, going from window, to door, out the villa, and down the steps, for a short walk to a bench.
Three minutes into the four-minute scene, she ever-so-sensually drops the sweater-dress, revealing that she’s wearing the skimpiest of a halter-bra and panties. Breathtaking.
Nonami herself aside, this is an extremely visually appealing DVD.The home, and the grounds it sits on, are spectacular — I’d move there tomorrow. (And if Nonami lived there, I’d move in today!)
The musical soundtrack suits every scene to-a-tee. (Yeah … it’s more-or-less elevator music … but it’s good elevator music).
The camera angles and the editing are top-notch (it’s good to see an Idol video in which the production crew actually knows what they’re doing).
And, finally, you can readily see that this DVD was designed to be viewed in 3-D.
My score: 4.50
(I simply have to deduct partial points for S.O.D. not including the appropriate 3-D glasses in the slipcase. To me, this is inexcusable. Otherwise, the DVD is as close to perfect as it gets).
Jan 19, 2010 @ 16:28:25
Great review.
I have just recently delved into the world of Miss Takizawa and I must say, she is a stunner. I’ve only seen two of her more recent DVD’s, Suki-Dakara and Yawahada so I don’t know if those are a good starting point but I enjoyed em very much. It seems like this new one is another gem. I might go pick this one up.
Cheers,
Sugar Bear
Jan 19, 2010 @ 17:38:45
First and foremost, a very large “thank you” to jmm for allowing me the opportunity to write this review. I truly enjoy the act of writing, and it gives me that much more pleasure when I can write about something (or someone) that I actually care about.
And an additional “much obliged” to jmm (in the “give credit where credit is due” department) …
Although I’m responsible for the text (for better or for worse), jmm inserted the vidcaps, and did so to perfection.
In Nonami’s case, a picture is worth far more than a thousand words.
Second, a heartfelt “thank you very much” to Sugar Bear for the opening comment. Trust me, a writer absolutely loves it when his work is appreciated.
Also, Sugar Bear, any place is a good place to start when it comes to Nonami.
My recommendation would be to save your dollars or pounds and get as many of her works as you can.
But, of course, I am not exactly what one might call unbiased.
Jan 19, 2010 @ 18:17:42
Uh… no – I respectfully disagree. This disc is easily her worst release since Nagomi (although admittedly still better than that snorefest). There are only two real issues here, but they’re so glaring that it makes the entire affair an exercise in mediocrity.
1) The 3D gimmick obviously took precedence over everything else – meaning there was track after track of forced camera angles which were neither flattering nor interesting. The most obvious example would be that god-awful baseball scene. Nomani tries her hardest to make the most of it, but the lackluster direction and camera work make it, at best, pedestrian. Yes, we get it. Object coming towards the camera. 3D. Whee. Now how about some basic understanding of framing a scene and pacing. It’s a shame when you have a subject a lovely as Nonami and it’s wasted on this kind of stuff.
2) For christ’s sake, there is more to shooting a gravure idol video than either having the camera zoomed in way too close or far out – the majority of the scenes either have the camera placed so far back from Nonami that it’s hard to get a good look at her (which is a crime) or zoomed in so close that you see nothing but one body part at a time. The latter isn’t such a bad thing in and of itself, as Nonami’s body is clearly one of the Wonders Of The World, but variety is the spice of life. Try mixing it up a little – pan across her wondeful body, zoom the camera in or out but stop with the myriad of static shots. Nonami is usually very good at playing to the camera, but she never really gets a chance to shine due to the crappy direction.
It also would have been nice to have a better sound track – most of what is presented is forgettable but at least appropriate – and a slightly wider variety of locations for the scenes, but those are nitpicks.
The only thing I will agree with here was that Nomami, as always, is utterly gorgeous and her wardrobe really accentuated her curves and, as would be expected, her unbelievable boobs. The latex cat suit probably the sexist thing she has worn in a few videos. The make-up department went a little overboard – but again, nitpicking.
There are going to be some who say: “Who cares if the direction is horrible? There’s a really hot chick on the screen!” And to those people I say: “If that perspective is working out for you, keep it up.” However, IMO there is more to doing a good gravure idol video that just putting some attractive woman up on the screen. Yes, you can get away with that for a while, but it takes some real charisma to hold that audience (aside: which is why I think Haruna Hana is headed for AV eventually – great body, average face but can’t really do anything beyond cute and “Look! I’m almost naked!”). The other half is the crew behind the camera – do they actually know how to appropriately film a subject? Can they pace a scene? Sadly, in this case, the answer would be no to both.
Make no mistake – Nonami is as sexy and beautiful as she’s ever been, but 3D x Shogeki Furetemite is disappointing and one of the weakest discs in her catalogue.
Jan 19, 2010 @ 19:27:01
No problem Mike from Michigan – your reviews are always welcome. We all know, as you have admitted so often, you are one of Nonami-chan’s biggest fans, so for your review to be very positive was not unexpected..
But you’re not a bigger fan than Zatoichi who I’ve sparred with in comments for years. But Zatoichi is also the architecht of this site, and he recently upgraded the wordpress platform for me to the newest version, so I am indebted to him for that. But that doesn’t mean he gets any benefit of the doubt with regard to opinions of Idol videos.
Having said that, I am inclined to agree with Z in this case. I found that the director and producers were not wrong to emphasize the 3D aspects – what was wrong is that they botched it much of the time. Like in the third scene – the pool scene with Nonami on the Blue plastic dolphin – it was so big that we couldn’t see the model- And with the intent of having the plastic dolphin’s head bobbing toward the camera for the 3D effects, it detracted from the model.
And the baseball scene was indeed badly handled. They might have deleted some of Nonami’s more erratic throws. They also should have deleted when she swung the bat and came nowhere near hitting the ball. And – since they told her to extend her arm with the ball toward the camera, and told her to extend her arm with the bat toward the camera, couldn’t thay have asked her to make a small adjustment so the ball or bat didn’t block her face from our view?
The scene at the creek deep in the woods – quite often the camera was too far away.
The last scene had too much of Nonami leaning in for the 3d emphasis.
But I had some other issues – who ever the hairdresser was – I think he/she did a bad job. Far too often Nonami’s hair was falling over her face or concealing her cleavage.
And we all pretty much agree that the music was ho-hum although I did like the flamenco-esque guitar music.
One more = The kimono scene: Personally I love this type of scene and generally the garments are spectacular. But in this case, I though the patterned pillows were far too busy a p[attern and severly detracted from Nonami.
So while I am closer to Z’s opinion than I am to Mike’s – I think that this was indeed a cut below her standard scores but a cut above Nagomi which was her lowest ranked video in my opinion as well as Z’s.
And to SugarBear – thanks for taking the time to comment. For your information I thought that Nonami’s two best videos were:
http://www.justmemikesnewalsoonvideo.com/2008/10/12/nonami-takizawa-itazura-na-shisen/
and
http://www.justmemikesnewalsoonvideo.com/2008/04/22/nonami-takizawa-my-darling/
I scored both of these at 5.0 (perfect scores). So if you’ve not seen these, they’re an excellent pair to increase your Nonami collection.
jmm
PS – to Zatoichi: what did you do for the 3D? Can you describe what type of 3D glasses are needed?
Jan 19, 2010 @ 20:07:02
jmm and Zatoichi -
Points well taken, guys.
You two both have a far keener critical eye than I do,
and I appreciate your comments very much …
and the readers here should be thankful for your input as well.
Jan 21, 2010 @ 00:24:07
This is pretty interesting, Nagomi got a 3.75 and this one was said to be better, so 4.5 does not seem that much… it seems that even being a double disc, its cost was the same as a regular idol DVD, so who knows what was going on. I guess a BluRay was probably more interesting (or at least for the top idols) but maybe is still too expensive.
I hope Nonami will be more active this year, though.
Thanks!
Jan 21, 2010 @ 06:01:05
I really disliked Nagomi – boring, ponderous with very few redeeming qualities aside from Nonami. I remember giving it a bad review back when I had my site up. On the JMM scale, I’d rate Nagomi a 2.5, and this one a 3.0. Just my opinion on the relative merits of each disc.
Jan 21, 2010 @ 06:42:43
Hi X –
Don’t confuse the scores. I gave the Nagomi DVD a 3.75.
Mike from Michigan did this 3D X Shogeki Furetemite review and awarded a 4.50 rating.
Re my past review of Nagomi (3.75): a little research showed it was the lowest score for any Nonami Takizawa DVD that I’ve reviewed on this site. Zatoichi clearly didn’t like it either.
There’s bound to be differences of opinion between viewers, just as there is bound to be differences of ratings from one DVD to the next DVD by any idol. Even if a specific viewer loves a model, and deems her videos as perfect, eventually he could decide that he liked one specific DVD better than another.
Jan 21, 2010 @ 14:07:44
Yeah, I knew Mike from Michigan was a guest review, but the comments didn’t sound that far away until Z rated it as a 2.5 (although I guess every die hard fan would want to check it out and judge by their own)
JMM, you never reviewed Yuka Tsukamoto’s November release, I saw her previous video and thought she was fine, but maybe not in that impossibly high level the top faves have. Since no review showed up, I can assume it was not good enough?
Jan 21, 2010 @ 14:16:06
X – Yuka Tsukamoto is still on my to do list, and I’ve started the review. Other things keep getting a higher preference, plus my other blog, The Arts, get’s a lot of my time. But I’ll see what I can do.
jmm
Jan 30, 2010 @ 00:27:50
Man, I really want to see this in 3D, but I’ve been hearing people say the video wouldn’t play on a PC and that regular 3D glasses won’t work? I’ll bad mad if I can’t see it in 3D
Hopefully 3D will take the gravure industry by storm and they’ll perfect it for really immersive videos, just think of the possibilities for simulated sex scenes
Jan 30, 2010 @ 06:04:36
Thanks for the comment Marth..
The future of 3D videos could be great.
jmm
Feb 02, 2010 @ 15:28:53
Hmmm… simulated sex scenes are not my idea of gravure IV… 2D or 3D… (OK, I let Yoko slip by with those since… well, she’s Yoko)
Feb 02, 2010 @ 15:51:31
I watch ‘em too…but they’re the least favorite parts of any Yoko DVD that I see.
Said another way…I don’t buy Yoko cuz she simulates sex. As Irishwars once posted…I’d watch her read a newspaper.
jmm
Feb 10, 2010 @ 02:03:05
Does the fact this video was made by SoD mean anything?
Just wondering cause I dont know that much about how the Gravure idol industry works, I would think to do a video with SoD would me a Possible AV career.
Feb 10, 2010 @ 06:24:14
Hi
Thanks for the comment Casanova4idols –
I can’t answer that question with any kind of surety or even directly. I thought that big bust idol Fuko went from gravure to Nude in the DVD Fuko: All Nude in Bali. That was an intermediate stop between gravure and AV for her.
http://www.justmemikesnewalsoonvideo.com/2009/04/16/fuko-fuko-all-nude-in-bali/
But that video was done for Air Control/Antenna.
And Hitomi Tanaka transitioned from gravure to AV with a SOD subsidiary Cutie & Honey. She made two DVDs for that label -
Premium Cutie and Premium Cutie 2. And while both were strictly gravure, but with a definitive adult element; neither included any nudity.
http://www.justmemikesnewalsoonvideo.com/2008/10/12/hitomi-tanaka-premium-cutie-2/
http://www.justmemikesnewalsoonvideo.com/2008/06/06/hitomi-tanaka-premium-cutie/
Shortly after Premium Cutie 2 was released , Hitomi’s first AV release appeared in November 2008. It was called Glamorous Body. Hitomi hasn’t looked back since. When her MoodyZ release arrives soon – it will be the 4th outfit that she has worked for in AV and I don’t think she’s missed a month without a release.
http://www.justmemikesnewalsoonvideo.com/2008/11/18/hitomi-glamorous-body/
So whether or not Nonami Takizawa is going in that direction (AV) cannot be inferred strictly from the release of Shogeki for the Glamorous Candy sub-group of SOD.
I’m not able to read the Japanese press – so I can’t really say. But I’m not betting that she will. Personally I hope she doesn’t do AV and I think she won’t seeing how she still would like to do mainstream movies and TV. And I mean beyond “B” movies and late-night TV.
jmm