The three Japanese starlets are "introduced" by James Wong in the trailer. Their photos are now ID'd in the gallery, and these pictures have been added as well.
http://hkmdb.com/db/movies/view.mhtml?i ... ay_set=eng

According to whomever created our English cast list, this first actress is Kishi Maiko, though she's not credited in English in the film at all, so I do wonder where we got her name from (and the other two below, for that matter). Googling that name doesn't bring back much except this blog (translated) for the Japanese band Magnolia. Is there a chance this actress went on to a fairly decent career in music, or is the name just a pseudonym or some such?:
http://translate.google.ca/translate?hl ... 26hs%3DuxK


Also note that the Chinese spelling of Miyashita Masayuki's name in the DB:
http://hkmdb.com/db/people/view.mhtml?i ... ay_set=eng doesn't quite match what's shown in the trailer (and opening credits). Third character is different. Can anyone fix?

Brian Thibodeau wrote:According to whomever created our English cast list, this first actress is Kishi Maiko,

Can't help with this one.

Brian Thibodeau wrote:Also note that the Chinese spelling of Miyashita Masayuki's name in the DB: ... doesn't quite match what's shown in the trailer (and opening credits). Third character is different. Can anyone fix?

Hoo boy. This one's a doozie.
Miyashita Masayuki is a correct reading of the name, and the 3rd character is correct. It is simply an alternate way to write the same character.
Problem is, Masayuki is a man's name.
I showed this one to the resident translator. After ranting about *expletives deleted* Chinese, she is of the opinion that it the name is actually Mako (i.e. with the 4th character wrongly chosen).

And as for Ichino Honokikawayo, she is of the opinion that there is no such name, and that a similarly silly Chinese simply made it up. And I must say, Honokikawayo is a new one on me as well.

STSH wrote:Hoo boy. This one's a doozie.
Miyashita Masayuki is a correct reading of the name, and the 3rd character is correct. It is simply an alternate way to write the same character.
Problem is, Masayuki is a man's name.
I showed this one to the resident translator. After ranting about *expletives deleted* Chinese, she is of the opinion that it the name is actually Mako (i.e. with the 4th character wrongly chosen).

And as for Ichino Honokikawayo, she is of the opinion that there is no such name, and that a similarly silly Chinese simply made it up. And I must say, Honokikawayo is a new one on me as well.

Googling Miyashita Masayuki brings back mostly males from various walks of life, and only one entertainment-related person, an executive producer from Japan:
http://us.imdb.com/name/nm1834482/
Though there's little to ID whether this person is a he or she, outside of the traditional usage of the name, but I doubt a Cat. III starlet of this level would go on to become a rather successful producer many years later, but then again, anything's possible!

Googling Ichino Honokikawayo brings back even fewer hits, two of them to the HKMDB, the other two to sites that probably took their information from the HKMDB!

Considering how many Japanese AV starlets turn up in these 90's sex comedies, I'm surprised none of these three don't have at least a few other searchable credits to their names.

Interestingly, the film plays out in three languages: Cantonese, Japanese and English. The Hong Kong players seem to be dubbing their own voices (James Wong and Tommy Wong are unmistakable, naturally), while the Japanese actresses seem to be dubbed in both English (with which they speak to the Chinese characters) and Japanese (when they speak to other Japanese characters), though it's tough to tell if they're using they're real voices in either language because the voices doing the dubbing are completely different in each language for any actress. The Japanese is fluent, but it seriously mismatches much of the lip movements onscreen; the English matches the lips more often, but still misses from time to time, as if the actresses just flapped their mouths so the filmmakers could insert whatever they needed to fit the plot!

In the end, all this audio voodoo makes me wonder if these girls are Chinese, not Japanese, and maybe all three English names are pseudonyms.

I couldn't shake the feeling that the same kind of bait-and-switch was taking place with the "Korean" actresses in THE WILD GOOSE CHASE, which STOOGES is a sequel to.