It was suddenly announced on October 28th, that KAT-TUN’s Akanishi Jin (24) will be making his silver screen debut. The movie, titled “BANDAGE” will hit theaters in 2010. The story is about the ‘band boom’ that swept over Japan in the beginning of the Heisei era (early 1990s). Playing Natsu, the leader and vocalist of a young band, called LANDS, trying to make it big, Akanishi is sure to play the part well. Along with his good looks, his weapons also include his comfortable singing voice and sexy dance moves. He’ll be able to demonstrate these to his hearts content on the screen.

Supervising the musical production is the films director and producer, Kobayashi Takeshi (49), and Iwai Shunji (45) will serve as script supervisor.

Kobayashi has previously directed “es,” the Mr. Children documentary, but this is his first time directing actors. He kept his enthusiasm and subtlety hidden inside, saying “I think it’s a good decision to have Akanishi Jin playing the part.”

Kobayashi is planning to write at least five songs for the band to perform in the movie and it’s likely the songs will be released as a CD in the future.

Akanishi said, full of self-confidence, “Being in KAT-TUN, I’m unable to show my shape as an artist, so I’m looking forward to playing this role. Until now, I don’t think there has been a Japanese film similar to this.”

Filming is expected to start on November 3rd.

There also appears to be a call for extras. If you’re living in Japan and have some free time between the beginning of November and early December, go check out this page and send in your application!

(Source 1, Source 2)

This week’s issue of Japanese tabloid magazine, FRIDAY, apparently reports that Akanishi Jin and model Nishiyama Maki were caught leaving for a “driving date” in Akanishi’s minivan. (Soccer Mom? Or Ladies’ Man? You decide.)

Nishiyama is the same “model-like beauty” that was photographed having dinner with Akanishi at a steakhouse about a month ago. She appeared on Cartoon KAT-TUN last year, so it seems that’s where the two hit it off.

Of course, Johnny’s is saying the two are just friends. No comment from Nishiyama’s agency.

Nishiyama later posted in her blog that she had been seen with him, but the two are just good friends. (She also seems to be proud of the fact that she’d been Friday’d. Like it’s a sign that’s she’s made it. But she’s perturbed by being refered to as “model-like” since she is actually a model. LOL! She’s cute, though.)

So, to sum up…

Famous People Have Social Lives! *gasp* The horror!!!

-______-

(Source)

English translations for all but six of Akanishi’s KAT-TUN Manuals (excluding any special promotional entries) have been posted here. The rest will be done sometime this weekend. Or not. *fails*

Also, between 10:00pm and midnight (EST) tonight, the 26th, I’ll be upgrading Wordpress and playing with the layout a bit, so if you come here and find nothing but jarbled php code and a woman curled up in a corner whimpering… that’s why. Hopefully, I won’t break too much.

And done. The upgrade only broke one thing (my beloved breadcrumbs plugin… *sobs*). I’ll be tampering with the layout off and on all weekend, but nothing major enough to make the entire site implode.