Radio Cameos in Japanese Cinema

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor, Jon, who writes:

Good day,

I regularly visit the SWLing Post and very much appreciate the breadth of content you provide on the shortwave hobby. In between the receiver reviews and stories on broadcaster activities, I much enjoy the pieces showing the radio gear that folks notice in television/films. Over the course of the COVID19 pandemic, I have been watching a lot of films from Japan, and in the process have spotted quite a few interesting receivers here and there. Below are some photos and details on some of these unsung stars of Japanese cinema. I think that JRC enthusiast Dan Robinson will agree with me that it’s the ensemble cast of JRCs in Virus that steal the show! 🙂

1. Masahiro Shinoda’s 1961 Epitaph to My Love opened with a very nice shot of a Sony TR-812 multi-band portable in a scene where a news broadcast is being heard in a bar setting.

https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/sony_tr_812_tr812.html

2. A Sony AFM-152J is shown in a contemporary home setting in Hiroshi Teshigahara’s 1966 film The Face of Another.

https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/sony_fmam_automatic_tuning_radio_esaki_diode_afm_152j.html

3. Kihachi Okamoto’s 1978 sci-fi film Blue Christmas featured a brief shot of a Sony ICF-7600 – the first of a legendary line of Sony portables that would carry “7600” in their designation.

https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/sony_icf_7600.html

4. There were several radio appearances in Kinji Fukasaku’s 1980 Virus – a film that took disaster movies to a new level by depicting both a global pandemic and a nuclear holocaust.

A range of JRC gear was captured in a scene that was set in a Japanese Antarctic base. Identifiable rigs include the NRD-10 and the NRD-71.

https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/jrc_nrd_10nrd1.html
https://www.rigpix.com/jrc/jrc_nrd71.htm

In another scene from the Antarctic base, a Trio (Kenwood) TS-820S is shown powered up.

https://www.radiomuseum.org/r/trio_kenwo_ts_820s_ts820s.html

5. Lastly, we have an unidentified tube receiver from Masahiro Shinoda’s Childhood Days – an interesting 1990 film about a school aged boy in World War II era Japan who, because of the bombing threat, is sent from his Tokyo home to live in a rural village.


Thank you for sharing this, Jon! It’s wonderful to include radio sightings from Japanese cinema in our ever-growing collection of radios in movies!

Spread the radio love

6 thoughts on “Radio Cameos in Japanese Cinema

  1. Ed

    I love that scene from Virus, where the Japanese station has a contact with VK0CC at Mawson station, because I know the real VK0CC at Mawson during the 1970s, Col Christiansen VK2BCC.

    Reply
    1. Jon

      I’m revisiting this topic after stumbling across a Japan Radio Museum online. That last radio in the batch pictured above appears to be the National Model R-4D, as pictured and profiled here:

      https://www.japanradiomuseum.com/tyukyulist-e.html#%E3%83%8A%E3%82%B7%E3%83%A7%E3%83%8A%E3%83%AB%E3%80%80R4-D%E5%9E%8B

      And, yes, it does appear that there were many Japanese radios from this era that had a very similar front panel layout, including the Televian R4 that you hyperlinked.

      Reply
  2. Ace

    Thanks for sharing these cameo stars of the screen. You must have an eagle eye, it was great to see them.

    Reply

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