"Land of the Rising Fastball" at Happy Trailers HD

(Image borrowed from Happy Trailers HD Posters)

New Japanese Baseball Film

I came upon this item while reading one of my favorite web sites, JapaneseBaseball.com. In one of the discussion boards, one of the film makers was looking for information about a baseball player and Japanese baseball fans. The film is still a work in progress; a film clip and trailer can be found at a site called Happy Trailers HD:

Link to film clip and trailer at Happy Trailers HD:
http://www.happytrailershd.com/main/node/539

So far, the film seems to be a good introduction to Japanese baseball to those unfamiliar with the game and phenomenon. It has interviews with all the right people and lots of scenes of Koshien and Hanshin Tigers' fans. I will try to keep abreast of this film and update this post when the film is completed and released.

When searching for more information on the film, I came across this dated (1985) but interesting Sports Illustrated article on Japanese baseball (with the same title as the film...).

Link to 1985 Sports Illustrated article, Land of the Rising Fastball:
http://vault.sportsillustrated.cnn.com/vault/article/magazine/MAG1119876/index.htm

There have been many recent academic articles on Japanese baseball by Robert Whiting and William Kelly among others. Such articles can be found by doing a keyword search for "Japanese baseball" at Japan Focus.

Resource for Filmmakers

Happy Trailers seems to be an interesting resource for filmmakers. From their "Pitch:"

Our Unique Philosophy
We operate under the realization that the conventional Hollywood system is nothing short of backwards when it comes to both pitching and producing films. Why produce an expensive film and then its comparatively inexpensive promotional trailer when you can simply produce the trailer, test the market for interest, and make a significantly more educated investment of your time and wallet? In terms of the pitch, why present your story in ninety pages of prose rather than five attention-grabbing minutes of film?

Our Mission Statement
Keeping Hollywood’s two flaws of pragmatism in mind, Happy Trailers HD has revolutionized the process of film production: the company takes your screenplays and films a trailer during one-to-two day shoots whose brevity make the A-list crew’s services affordable. Next, Happy Trailers HD edits and scores the footage, creating handsome three-to-five minute promotional trailers on high-definition video. The trailers are marketed by Happy Trailer HD’s team of publicity and advertising professionals, who create a tagline, poster art, and website, as well as demographics monitoring. Finally, when it comes time for Happy Trailer HD’s producers to pitch your project to our established niche of production and distribution companies, the trailer is used not as a substitute for your screenplay, but as an attention-grabbing complement.

There are a lot of resources available at Happy Trailers, including information on film festivals, image galleries, stock footage and links to other resources. Definately worth a look for anyone interested in film.