Miyavi sat down with Oricon last month to talk about his newest album, "This Iz The Japanese Kabuki Rock." sigelx provides a translation of the interview.

"Whose makeup do you want to copy this spring?" Oricon asked this question to 450 women in a survey earlier this year, and the #1 answer was popular model Yuri Ebihara. #2 was Misaki Ito, tied with talento Suzanne. Shoko Nakagawa and Yui Aragaki tied for #4.

Sportscaster Rie Oh, who is the daughter of baseball great Sadaharu Oh, publicly revealed on Wednesday that she and doctor Masaki Honda have officially broken off their engagement.

The two announced in early December that they were planning to marry, but later that month they postponed their wedding. Since then, the couple hadn't met until about a week ago, when they talked things over and decided to just be friends.

Last week, EXILE took the #1 spot on the album charts with "EXILE CATCHY BEST," selling 680,000 copies. This week, they remained on top, selling another 187,000 copies to fend off aiko's "Himitsu," which came fairly close with 167,000 in sales.

Kaela Kimura, 244 ENDLI-x (Tsuyoshi Domoto's solo project), and Miliyah Kato rounded out the Top 5, with all of them selling more than 80,000 copies. The 19-year-old Kato is only the second artist to have her first three albums make the Top 5 while still in her teens (Hikaru Utada was the first).

Also in the top 10 were Denki Groove (#9) and Boowy (#10).

Only four new songs made the top 10 on the singles chart, with #1 being L'Arc~en~Ciel's "DRINK IT DOWN" at 94,000 copies. While 244 ENDLI-x's album was third in the rankings, he achieved #2 with his simultaneously released single. He was followed at #3 by another solo project, Sukima Switch's Takuya Ohashi. Kaori Mizumori entered the charts at #5.

On Wednesday, director Takeshi Kitano held a press conference for his latest film, "Achilles to Kame" ("Achilles and the Tortoise," named after one of Zeno's paradoxes). The movie rounds out his self-reflective "trilogy" that began with "Takeshis'" in 2005 and continued with "Kantoku Banzai!" last year.

"Achilles to Kame" documents the life of a painter named Machisu (Kitano) who continues pursuing his dream as an artist despite his lack of success. Kanako Higuchi plays his wife, while Yurei Yanagi and Kumiko Aso play the same couple in their younger years.

According to Kitano, the film is a story depicting the "cruelty" of being an artist, under the idea that someone without talent should face reality and still try their best. He commented that he feels the same way with his own films, continuing to make movies without regard to whether the movie is successful. Kitano also criticized the lack of originality in the current Japanese film industry.

It is said that about 70 of Kitano's own art pieces will appear on screen.

Filming started on February 10 and is due to finish in the middle of this month. Theatrical release has been scheduled for this fall, but Kitano plans to first take the movie to the Venice Film Festival, which runs from August 27 to September 6.

On Wednesday, writer Yuji Sakamoto was named as the winner of the 26th Kuniko Mukoda Prize, which honors television drama screenwriters. Sakamoto won the award for the script used in Fuji TV's "Watashitachi no Kyoukasho" last spring.

Sakamoto is currently doing the screenplay for TBS's "Ryokiteki na Kanojo," which premieres on the 20th.

From their latest no. 1 album "EXILE CATCHY BEST," EXILE's "Fly Away" has been chosen as the theme song for TV Tokyo's broadcast of the 2008 Summer Olympics in Beijing.

"Fly Away" was the group's third single, released in 2002. The song expresses the feeling of facing one's dream and pushing forward towards it. Group leader HIRO commented that the song is full of strong emotions, and that he was honored the song was chosen to cheer on the Japanese athletes.

TV Tokyo's coverage includes the men's 81kg and women's 63kg judo, the men's gymnastics finals, and the men's soccer finals.