Category Archives: Culture
Hondas for Guys & Girls
Continuing on the theme of youthful, frolicking couples in nostalgic automotive ads, here’s a 1960s Honda print ad featuring products for “Guys & Girls” — a Honda N360 and E300 portable generator for camping families, and a Monkey Z50M on which you can … Continue reading
The Story of Diane Krey, the “Mary” behind the Kenmeri Skyline
The C10 hakosuka GT-R made “Skyline” a legend among Japanese gearheads, but the C110 kenmeri made it a household name. Its popularity was due in no small part to the now re-famous Ken & Mary television commercials that gave the fourth-gen Skyline its nickname and … Continue reading
Posted in cm, nissan
Tagged c110, datsun, diane krey, jimmy zinnai, kenmeri, kgc110, kpgc110, nissan, skyline
34 Comments
Animated Hondas from new “Blue Skies for our Children” ad campaign
Honda’s new ad campaign features some animated classics and a Watchmen-like generational mirror. The only question that remains is why, when the son gets to the EG, doesn’t slam it while riding around in baseball hat cocked at a 45 … Continue reading
Classic CM: Nissan Sunny Lexprix to the rescue!
The 1982 B11 Nissan Sentra was, even by the most generous metric, not a beloved car. Like most automakers Nissan had emerged from the Decade of Disco bruised, battered and choked with performance-sapping emissions equipment. The early Eighties were known for … Continue reading
Friday Video (sort of): S40 Crown in Reborn Toyota campaign promising “Fun to Drive, Again”
Toyota has launched a mysterious website called Reborn-Toyota for the Japanese market. The sparse page has nothing but a slideshow depicting actor “Beat” Takeshi Kitano and singer Takuya Kimura dressed as 16th century daimyo warriors looking gangster behind the wheel of a piano black S40 … Continue reading
Posted in cm, toyota
Tagged beat takeshi, cm, crown, hideyoshi toyotomi, ms41, nobunaga oda, reborn, s40, shuto, takeshi kitano, takuya kimura, toyota
7 Comments
Vintage Toyota Land Cruisers are in advertisements everywhere
There’s an adage that says once is a fluke, twice is a coincidence, three times is a trend. If that’s the case, then old Toyota Land Cruisers are about to become fashion icons. Just in the last month alone, we’ve … Continue reading
Tomica Limited Vintage Toyota Crown CM Collection
Toyotaku will want to keep their eyes peeled on October 5, when Tomica will release the limited edition Toyota Crown CM Collection. The set, created in conjunction with media company Avex, will contain a 1:64 scale Tomica Limited Vintage RS41 Toyopet Crown … Continue reading
Posted in cm, minicars, toyota
Tagged cm, crown, rs41, tomica, tomica limited vintage, toyota
8 Comments
Old Ad: Kenmeri Nissan Skyline for Techno Project TR-V
Was the Nissan Fairlady Z432 ad just a bit too stock for you? Maybe a vintage rim ad for the Techno TR-V is more your style. This kenmeri shows how things were done back in the day — shakotan stance, … Continue reading
World’s First Nissan Fairlady Z Newspaper Ad
Ready to go back in time? This is the first newspaper ad in history to fully reveal the Nissan Fairlady Z. It was published on October 20, 1969, four days before the 16th Tokyo Motor Show, where the S30 was … Continue reading
Friday Video: Pentax Commercial Starring Honda N360 and Japan’s 1960s GT Legends
Check out this commercial for Pentax Cameras, which has many things making it awesome. Let’s see: chick is cute drives a mod looking rally-modified Honda N360 Toyota 2000GT Mazda Cosmo Sports Nissan Fairlady Z Toyota S40 Crown police car vintage … Continue reading
MX73 Toyota Cressida Outpaces Your Bourgeois Euro Saloons
Nowadays nostalgists regard the MX73 Toyota Cressida as a RWD four-door Supra for the shakotan/bosozoku/drift/VIP crowd, but it spent much of its existence as an understated executive sedan, a Japanese alternative to Benzes, Bimmers and Jyaaags in the pre-Lexus days. For … Continue reading
Chrysler Galant, by Mitsubishi, Gets Around
After seeing the Wink Martindale promo from Monday, Australian JNC reader Tristian C. dropped this ad for the Chrysler Galant in our inbox. The Triple Diamond Mafia masqueraded as Chryslers down under, with Mitsubishi‘s Colt Galant (which was also sold … Continue reading
1972 Nissan Sunny Calendar Found in Abandoned Yamanashi-ken House
On the dark-side of Fuji-san, a village with 200-year-old thatched-roof buildings was abandoned in the 1970s. In one of the remote and largely intact houses, hanging from the shredded shoji, in a living room full of bear- and tanuki-tossed futons … Continue reading
Activision Enduro Datsun 280ZX Pace Car Contest
Hey, remember Enduro? Neither do we. But apparently it was the freakin’ Forza Motorsport of 1983, made for the Atari system. There was a contest where you could win a Datsun 280ZX Turbo pace car in the vein of the … Continue reading
Posted in cm, datsun, nissan, Video Games
Tagged 280zx, activision, caesar's palace grand prix, campaign, contest, datsun, enduro, fairlady z, las vegas grand prix, nissan, pace car, race for riches, s130
18 Comments
Datsun 610 and My Adidas Do the Illest Things
How fresh is this? A new Adidas commercial prominently features a Datsun 610 Coupe, fender mirrors and all, beside a bird dancing in pajamas. We’ve been documenting the appearance of J-tin in advertisements for a while now because, well, it’s … Continue reading
Honda CR-Z Ad Glimpses Soichiro's Genius
The Honda CR-Z went on sale in Japan last week. It may not be the long-awaited reincarnation of the CR-X, but the accompanying commercial gives us glimpses of past greats like the Super Cub, T360, S600s both roadster and coupe, … Continue reading
Classic CM: Mazda Capella is Autobahn Bound
This baby was made for scaling the Alps, breezing down the Autobahn, and evoking grand helicopter tracking shots! You probably can’t even remember the last time you saw one of these on the streets, but the Japanese the rear-wheel-drive coupe … Continue reading
Finally, A Toyota Ad with Nostalgics!
Finally, an ad where Toyota honors its heritage instead of asking people to crush it. And all it took was a global recall of 8 million cars, the worst in the company’s history, and non-stop cries for the rolling heads … Continue reading
Posted in cm, toyota
Tagged akio toyoda, audi, corona, cressida, fj40, land cruiser, mx32, rt40, toyota
13 Comments
Ken Takakura Wants to Put YOU in a Mitsubishi
Most of us only know actor Ken Takakura from Ridley Scott’s 1989 film Black Rain. He played a cop, but in Japan Takakura is as synonymous with yakuza movies as DeNiro is with Italian mob flicks. Therefore, it’s only fitting … Continue reading
