Misc. Stuff: 1993


"Pawaa Gurabu dai suki. Yabai desu yo."

This is the Japanese VHS release of a movie that needs no introduction... Fred Savage's The Wizard.

This is a really curious release for several reasons: Like many English-language movies released in Japan, the completely sensible title of The Wizard has been changed into a nonsensical title, still in English, mind you, but written in Katakana. This classic of modern cinema is now called Sweet Road. Although, given the lack of L/R distinction in Japanese, the latter half of the title can also be read as either "Lord" or "Load". I prefer to read it as Sweet Load just because of the uncomfortable innuendo it conjures up.

Hence, Fred Savage's Sweet Load.

The other curious thing about this movie is that it was released to video (I don't think it ever hit the theatres) in Japan in November 1992, way too late for the "Nintendo" aspects (read: all) of the movie to have any meaning. Hell, even if it had come to Japan at the same time as the U.S., in late 1989, Japanese gamers would have all said to each other, "So friggin' what? We've all been playing Super Mario 3 for what, like a year now?"


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