The Boston Globe from Boston, Massachusetts • 39

THE BOSTON GLOBE WEDNESDAY, MAY 15, 1996 IV 5 1 r4; i 4 1 I v-! 1.JWB I I I Rise and shine with 'Sailor Moon' Animated show's fans I get up at dawn to watch "SAILOR" 1 Continued from Page 35 September that "Sailor Moon" was destined to disappear from the US television horizon at the end of the current season. As a result, Sonski received several petitions, some 4,000 signatures in all, calling for a reversal of rumored fortune. "In terms of fanaticism," she says, "I've never seen anything like this." i i Inexplicable fun Bill Alexander, Leigh's father, sounds a tad puzzled, to). "It's God-awful and I don't understand why it's popular" is his critical take on "Sailor Moon." "But anything that gets a teen-ager up at 5:30 in the morning to watch TV" has got to have some cultural zip to it." Still, anyone stumbling across "Sailor Moon" for the first time might be forgiven for wondering what all the fuss is about Is this really the serialized show that has been a monster hit in Japan since 1992, has swept Europe and Canada, generating $2.5 billion in wordwide sales of licensed merchandise? (Some 200 products are churned out by 90 manufacturers in the United States.) Based on a Japanese comic book series, the show seems merely to combine your basic cartoon storyline with simple, pastel-laden artwork. Even hard-core fans admit to having been underwhelmed upon their initial encounter with the slim-waisted and short-skirted Serena, a a Sailor Moon, and her four teen-age cronies, a a the Sailor Scouts.

"The first time you see it, you say, "Well, the charac- Ninth-grader Leigh Alexander of Medway (left) admires computer printouts from her favorite TV show, "Sailor Moon" (above). GLOBE STAFF PHOTO SUZANNE KREITER want to know about "Sailor Moon." (Forty percent of the show's viewers are male, according to DIC.) "I think the show has a lot of things that you don't find in American cartoons," says Aromdee, who, like Wand, has a 65-vol-ume videotape library of "SM" episodes. "It has more of a continuing storyline, characters who are allowed to die, lots of cultural references. There hasn't been anything like this on US TV for a long time." Like many older "Sailor Moon" fans, Aromdee is a devotee of Japanese cartoons, a genre known as anime (pronounced ANN-i-may). Many of these fans are college students or graduates who are members of college anime clubs.

MIT, Harvard and Boston University all have such clusters of fans for whom "Sailor Moon," despite its featherbrained heroine, represents the biggest US TV news since the Japanese export of "Robotech" during the mid-1980s. "It's lightweight, but it's fun," says Dan Eyer, a 30-year-old Cambridge computer programmer and Yale graduate, who has watched his fair share of "Sailor Moon" episodes. "I don't consider it the best thing I've ever seen, but it's far from being the worst." -Richard Chang, a Harvard sophomore, says he stum- bled across "Sailor Moon" last fall and has since tuned in more than 100 times in his Quincy House room. other things, Chang likes the fact that Serena has the personality of an honest-to-God teen-ager. "Granted, no human being could have those body proportions," he con" cedes.

"And the romance gets a little cheesy. But there are nuggets of wisdom in there. And Serena is not grace- ful, not a good student She's just a typical person. "Of course," Chang adds quickly, "she also happens to have been sent from a moon kingdom thousands of ,1 years ago. But we can overlook that" ters are silly and the animations aren't says Jennifer Wand of Newton, a 17-year-old high school senior who admits to being so addicted to the show that she has taped all 65 episodes aired in the United States so far.

"So you laugh at it for a while, and then you hit a landmark episode where someone dies or something and you find yourself crying. "It's a phenomenon," Wand adds. "It's an enigma. "Oh, man, I just can't explain it." Animated by anime Who can? Let's try Ken Aromdee, who recently earned a doctorate in computer science from Johns Hopkins University. Aromdee has created one of the Internet sites that tells you more than you could possibly pokes holes in a body piercer's logic An Englishman refights the battles of America their neighbors.

Older people may need to take the first step and let their neighbors know they have a special need. AARP is piloting a new program, AARP Connections for Independent Living, designed to link potential volunteers with those needing assistance in their communities through appropriate local agencies. AARP also has information on how people can remain independent as they age. Write to: Staying in Charge FIELDS OF BATTLE The Wars for North America By John Keegan Knopf, 338 pp, illustrated, $30 ism occurred, but the claim of the Plains Indians to the heartland of the continent he finds invalid. Proud warrior nomads, they represent for Keegan a society interested solely in "hunting, pillage and war." This overlooks the religious cosmology of the tribes, which has been so eloquently described by Rev.

Peter Powell and others, though it does not deflect the thrust of Keegan's argument that fewer than a million people claimed to possess land capable of sustaining millions waiting to be fed "the claims not of oppresed primitives but of the selfish rich." This may sound like the jacket copy, which inevitably calls Keegan "a modern day de Tocqueville," though it is impossible to imagine de Tocqueville in a Trailways bus, one of Keegan's favorite modes of transportation. He gives Trailways a heartfelt plug as it carries him across the Carolinas and the blue highways and backroads of the South. Traveling through a landscape like the South's (with its martial traditions, his favorite American region), Keegan can reconnoiter such sites as the city of Ninety Six, associated with the British occupation of Charlestown in 1780. It is not the same as flying over a landscape, a matter of abstract patterns; it is the military historian's way, the close-up view. At the finish, there is "so much of America seen, so much still to see," and if the final chapter, a homage to the Wright brothers, seems to belong to another book entirely, it bears the elegant cachet of Keegan's direct observation of his subject A doctor Dear Ann Landers: I am a 36-year-old nuclear welding inspector and just finished reading the letter from the woman whose granddaughter was into tattoos and body piercing.

I have only two tattoos, but I have 63 earrings in my ears, one in my tongue, one in my hand (in the webbing between my thumb and index finger), three in each nipple and one "down south," as you put it I have been interviewed on the radio about body piercing, and wherever I go, people want to know why I do this. My goal is to establish the world's record for the number of ear piercings and maybe body piercings. As far as family members are concerned, they understand that I always have marched to a different drummer. My father gets upset about it, but my mother is cool. When I go home to visit, I usually take most of the rings out You said the girl would "end up with several holes in unwanted places." It's a fact that when you remove the rings or studs, the holes close up.

It might take some time and leave scar tissue, but eventually, healing would take place. SAWYER, MICH. Thanks for your comments. I received more from an authority on 3 HOURS FREE VALIDATED PARKING KthDALL 5QUARC ONE KENDALL SOUARE CAMBRIDGE 4M-MM ClM 333-FILM (081 lt TlCttll Sliowllmol DEAD MAN A THE MONSTER ffl? 2 25) 4 lUUCMUKW.TKIBTOFWMUMtmTIM Hit COLD FEVER MB (2:051 4:06,8 11:91 MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATER 3000 K13 I2W 3 51.5 4.7:38! 21 JANE EYRE 1231 i) 72555 THECEUUlOWClOSnm itS 1 35 THE FLOWER Of MY SECRET (2.451,7:3 FARGO 111 525,7 lt5l ANTONIA'S LINE (4151 711 25 Ik ACCEPTED FOR THIS ENGAGEMENT Jwww.movie.com mm (D15937), AARP, Box 22796, Long Beach, CA 90801-5796. BERNICE B.

SHEPARD American Association of Retired Persons Board of Directors BARGAIN MATINEES UNTIL 6PM DAILY LATE SHOWS FRIDAY SATURDAY THE GREAT WHfTE WTPE 100 90S SOS 1000 THE PALLBEARER 1110 430 715 MS AT PG13 THE CRAFT 740 1010 FLIRTING WTTH DISASTER eour mm MULHOLLAND FALLS t3O02M4S0nO100S THE QUEST 1 240 2 600720940 PG13 THUWOCABI 1154157H9SO OCWrr II FEAR 715 PM barb wire mono FARGO 1007J0MO TWISTER 100 400 710 1O0S ITDWO PG13 THE BIRDCAGE 1IS4tS710 950 THE GREAT WHTTE HYPE 1240150505745 1010 BARB WIRE 1HSMA1IEE THE PALLBEARER 11111115 440 715 MS PG13 THE CRAFT 1130 145 500 730 10M THE QUEST 1215 240 450 719 K13 mULHOLlAND FALLS 13S4S9740101I THE TRUTH ABOUT CATS ft DOGS 1100 21S 430 PG13 700 9M TWISTER (ONlSCRfDlS) PG13 SCREEN 1 110 400 7 955 DOUYITDV0 SCREEN! I MO 135 SOS 750 ION 0X7141 iTEVO I0YS 1210120435 705030 PCI THE CRAFT 1273044073314 POUT STEREO LAST DANCE 100 BARB WIRE 1M0M4TMEI THE PALLBEARER IBS MO 4S0 711 OH K1 THE GREAT WHITE HYPE 1130 145 4SS 710 HO THE TRUTH ABOUT CATS ft OOGS 1200210410 PGU 710049 MULHOLLAND FALLS miUTTS THE QUEST 120S21542S730I4S KK7DTITEAEO PG13 SUNSET PARK 4S07401000 JAMES AND THE GUJtT PEACH 100 300500 TOO PG PRIMAL FEAR 110410730 1011 AW7DI 1710 II THE BIRDCAGE 12S40073S100) TWISTER (OHISCJED K13 SCREEN! 100400 710 050 PRaTAl ITlRfO kreeni Iiooi30 5oo74sioi5 acnAiimo BOYS 1210 225 410 715 930 PG13 LAST DANCE 3305007351010 THE CRAFT 12101401107411011 BARB WIRE lUSMATMx I THE PALLBEARER 1235250 SOS 7501 DOS PG13 OLfT II ERf 0 THE GREAT WHITE HYPE 122S1N4497SI40 THE TRUTH ABOUT GATS ft BOGS 1200215430 PCI 720 048 W1K HOLLAND FAILS 849104S THE QUEST 11151)5 073S 1000 PS1 JAMES ARB THE BAiaPtACH IM M544S TOO PC PRI9AAL FEAR 11S41S7O0ISO THE BIRDCAGE 110 410 710 tSJ TWISTER tWlSCRraa) PCI) 101409 709990 ParTXSmPP tOUXt 1201 235 14 750 1030 tOUYflBK BOYS 1205 114 41I7159U MUTnCM PCI) THE GREAT WMTE HYPE 1245 XOtll 745 1020 THE CRAFT WIS t4 OSS 724 1016 lOUriTBaa BARB WIRE 1700MATM3 THE PALLBEARER 1201 115 415 70S 130 Pgl) LAST DANCE 1100 HO 440 71S 1000 THE TRUTH AtOUT CATS DOCS 121022S44S PCI 7301005 OLNOLLAJW FALLS 100 70S THE QUEST 235 511 749 1011 PC1 3 SLISfT Hn 435719945 THE SUSSIIIVII 419 931 JAW Al THE GUUHPtUCH 1230 23S4JS PC FEAR 719940 PRPMAL FEAR 1KO 345700 IO00 OtrVTR A C044PANT 120 B'-'-llH 1T94W7T999 POUYtTCTTO 110 100 130 400 (OS 710 7 PCI) onion twjTumw THE CRAFT BHWH9NII9II P0MTSIB THE GREAT WHTTE RTPE 1149235110 730 1900 LAST BANCC 1719130440730 1900 THE PAliAEAAFR 17492599473900 pt THE TRUTH AOOUT CATS A BOGS 111 5 D5 490 PGU mow nuTnm THf IWIST 1201 119 431 710 93S ko P94PRAI FEAR 1004097101000 TUf OiTt4fit K9C4-OPM0 JAMES AND THE CUM PEACH HOPS BARS WWE Oil PH 0417 nots PS PCI) FEM T3om SWSFTPAP9I tl99J the subject. I hope you and others who are into big-time piercing will take it seriously. He writes: Dear Ann Landers: Piercing tissues of the mouth and oral cavity with rings, small metal barbells or other objects can cause permanent damage. Objects close to the teeth can cause fractures to the teeth and damage cheek tissue. Permanent numbness and loss of taste or movement may result if a nerve is accidentally pierced.

Persistent bleeding or an immovable clot in the blood vessel could develop. Damage to the salivary gland duct may also occur from excessive drooling caused by inflamed and enlarged lips after piercing. HOWARD S. GLAZER, DDS, FAGD president, Academy of General Dentistry, Chicago Dear Ann Landers: A recent letter really struck a chord with us at AARP. A 70-plus widow in Billings, Mont, said her neighbors' teen-ager shoveled his walk but didn't think to do hers as well.

Help with tasks such as shoveling snow, yardwork or shopping can mean a lot to older people who want to remain in their homes. Fortunately, most communities have programs or individual good Samaritans ready and willing to help General Cinema EC' ALL CINEMAS EQUIPPED BARGAIN MATINEES TILL 6 PM DAILY I77-ISOO 1ES TWISTER ON TWO SCDENS PGI3 SCKEEN 1 11:00 1 35 4 10 O0 IIS SCREEN 2 TODAY 11:30 2 OS 5 00 7 45 10:10 SCREEN 2 NO SHOWS TOMORROW THU LAST DANCE TODAY 12 15 2:40 5 00 7:30 55 THU 12:15 2:40 5:00 Th Truth About CATS A DOGS 12 00 2:30 5 00 7:35 9:55 PGI3 DOUT PRIMAL FEAR 1:00 4:00 7 00 9:50 r.in $Jj0j FLUH1 Hii iHOWRS 01P 508-623-4404 THE EDGE 2 oo ADMISSION TWISTER ON THREE SCREENS TO13" SCREEN 1 12 00 3:00 5:40 I 30 MttTAl SCREEN 2 4 10 7 00 SO IM SCREEN 3 1:00 4 SO 7 40 10:20 MWTH BOYS 12:15 2 JO 4:30 7 30 9:40 PG13 IM THE PALLBEARER 12 15 1 10 4 SO 7 20 9 40 PG11 Huh OLIVER A COMPANY I 30 3 30 5:30 DISITU FLIflTINO WITH DISASTER 1:153:40 5 50 8 00 10 I0 THE CRAFT 13 20 3 00 5 13 7 55 10 20 HM000 MULMOLLANO FALLS 1 00 3-50 6 15 9 00 DIOIIAt JAMES 1 Hm GIANT PEACH 12:40 2 40 5 00 PG PRIMAL FEAR 1 00 3 50 40 10 00 RBMHTU Tlx Truth About CATS A DOGS Jj-J BARB WIRE 12 30 2 50 5 10 7 30 9 50 RS. WINTERBOUflNE 7 00 9 30 RG13 FARGO 12: 50 3 10 5 30 7 45 10 00 I FEAR 00 10 20 D4SITAL i l.i'i.-Mf-l.-mi IH29-9200I TWISTER ON TWO SCREENS PG13 SCREEN 1 1:00 3 50 6:45 9 30 WWTU IKI SCREEN 2 11 00 1 30 4 20 7 15 10 00 DM4TAI ml THE PALLBEARER 12 202 35 4:45 309 45 THE GREAT WHITE HYPE 1 40 4 50 7 00 9 15 JAMES 1 tho GIANT PEACH 12 30 1 30 4 30 PG THE BIRDCAGE 1 OS 9 20 HQ4TA1 PRIMAL FEAR 12 SO 1 45 i 55 9 40 I Tho Truth About CATS A DOGS 12 15 2 35 4 40 7:25 9 SO PG13 BWITW THE OUEST 1 20 3 40 1 SO 9 10 PGU THE CRAFT 1:10 4 05 7 20 9-55 LAST DANCE 40 9 05 (2 MULMOLLANO FALLS 4 10 I TACO 5M-S32-I4N THE G-tAT WHITE HYPE I 55 4 30 7 10 9 10RKXJT THE OUEST 1 45 4 20 7 00 9 20 PG13 JAMES tho GIANT PEACH 1:00 3:00 5 00 7 OSPG LAST DANCE 9 05 ITIJIIOI TWISTER ON TWO SCREWS PG13 SCREEN 1 II 00 1:45 4 30 7 IS 10 05 SCREEN 1 1 15 4 00 4 45 9 30 IWTtt BOYS 17 40 2 55 5 10 7 5 9 45 PG3 THE GREAT WHITE HYPE 12 IS 1 303 15 SO 10 MR LAST DANCE II 40 2 15 4 40 7 10 9 35 THE OUEST 12 3S 2 SO 5 IS 7 40 0tl G11 THC OlOOr.AAfl IIKllBllflllltl PRIMAL FEAR 11 45 3 35 4 55 9 401 Tho Truth About CATS A OOGS 1KK2 20 4 4S 7 00 9 S0PC.I3 BMItAA BARB WI 12 20 5 05 9 S3 I MULMOLLANO FALLS 5 00 FEAR TD04 2 45 7 3S nl 1 4S I TftCO TW.bTfcR 45 3 45 7 5 )C 15 tii3 Tlw9niAMM CITS (BOGS 1 40 4 00 7 30 00G13 JAMES A tho GIANT PEACH 140 1 00 i 0 PG THE BIRDCAGE 7 00 SO I VIS II Ll I By Robert Taylor GLOBE CORRESPONDENT The military historian John Keegan, a product of Balliol College, Oxford, and a former senior lecturer at B00k Sandhurst the British West Point, KeVieW knows America i better than most Americans. He has made uncounted visits over nearly 40 years, starting with a passport stamped "Boston," which inaugurated the most memorable journey of his life, his first visit tq the battlefields of the American Civil War. "I love America," he writes, opening his panoramic account of battle during four centuries on the North American continent "I wonder how many Englishmen can say that?" (Noel Coward came close: He wrote "I have travelled far From Northumberland to Zanzibar And I find America Keegan covers an epic canvas of struggle, triumph and but "Fields of Bat-tlfe" is also a memoir about the evolution of a single sensibility.

The tension between grand strategies and private experience lends the prose its personal stamp. As a military historian, Keegan derives his special strength not only from his supple prose but from going over the ground himself. A few years ago, for example, he visited the terrain of the Seven Days Battles of June 1862. He had taught this campaign to cadets, followed it through maps, and because McClellan's battles with Lee had lasted seven days, assumed the arenas of the action were widely separated. He discovered otherwise, a vivid lesson "in the human inclination to take from a map what one expects to see, not what it is designed to tell you." There is no substitute in military his tory for personal witness.

Geography and its impact on warfare is a corollary major theme, and Keegan has organized his narrative around the forts that were the fulcrum of power the forts of New France; the fort at Yorktown, decisive in two wars; the forts of the Confederacy; and the forts of the old West, splayed across a map like a hand grasping the Plains. Custer has been done so often one might assume there's nothing new, but Keegan looks at the Little Big Horn through eyes accustomed to the cannonades of Waterloo and offers fresh perspectives: "Custer's dismissal of all his Indian scouts at a moment when a European officer would have been counting every rifle is in itself a demonstration of his persisting sense of superiority over the Sioux." Keegan's conclusions about the Indian Wars run counter to the notion of the noble savage dispossessed by imperialism. He agrees that much tragic racial- BARGAIN TIMES IN PARENTHESIS) For SHOWTIMES and TICKETS CALL 333-FILM and Enter Code next to theater below Telephone Ticketing 100 HUNHNGlONAVt 2b6-1300 S3 MOONS AT COPLEY PtACt BARABC WfTH VUJOATtOH ENTER AFTER 5PM A LEAVE BEFORE 2AM BOYS (1200), (400), 6:10, 8:10, 10:20 PG13 7:40, 10:00 GREAT WHITE HYPE (300), 9:50 LAST DANCE 7:30, 10:10 BARB WIRE (1 30), 7:00 TRUTH ABOUT CATS AND DOGS (1000), (11 00), (1 (2 30), 600, 7:10, 8:20, 9:30 PG-13 JANE EYRE PM FEAR (11 50). 9:20 JAMES AND THE GIANT PEACH (11 30). (1 630 PG KIDS IN THE HALL BRAIN CANDY 9:10 PM BIRDCAGE (1 6:50.

9:40 DEAD MAN WALKING (1 50) 6 40 606 CUMM AVfc. NR KfcNMUKb SQ. 424-1 SUP DEAD MAN (150). (4O0). 7:00.

9:45 PALLBEARER (1 00), (i30), 7:45, 1000 PG13 MYSTERY SCIENCE THEATRE 3000-(1 40), (5:15) 7:30. 9 15 PG13 FLIRTING WITH DISASTER 7:15, 930 FARGO 12-00) '4151 6 45 9O0 DAUONSI. OPP SHtRAlON BUS. M6-2H0 DISC PARKINS AVAL AT PILGRIM GARAGE ADJ. CHER! TWISTER (1 7:00.

7 50, 9:50, 10:35 PG13 MULHOLLAND FALLS (1 40), 7:30, 10:05 PRIMAL FEAR (V20) 14 20). 715. 10 20 fl 2oOSiUAriI ST. NtARPAnKSU. 482-1222 QUEST (2O0), 720.

9.40 PG13 SUNSET PARK -(1451 14 20) 700 920 10 lHUHCH SI CAMbHiuuf. tio4-4ao0 BOYS (5.45), 8 00. 10:10 APG13 PALLBEARER (1 OO). 7:40, 90 BIRDCAGE 7:30, 10:20 DEAD MAN WALKING (4:15) POSTMAN -(1245M4O0I 650 910 PG bi jPK ST NlAH KAHwAnU SO bol FLIRTING VtTTH DISASTER. POO' f3i 6151 7 30 950 1-HldH PlA bol -2QU TWSTER-IHO).

230), 1330). (5001 600. 730, 8J0. 1000 PGI3 LAST DANCE (1 20), (420), 7:50. 10:10 GREAT WHITE HYPE (200), (4 00), 6:10, 8:15, 10:30 BARB WIRE -8 40 PM QUEST -(12 40).

(3 20). (5 501 600, 1040 PG13 TRUTH ABOUT CATS AND DOGS (12 JO). (2 50), (510). 950 PG-13 MULHXXLANOFALLS-(12 5OI.3 50.9:30 JAMES AND THE GIANT PEACH- (1 10). 13 00).

(450). 70J) PG PRIMAL FER -II 501 14 301 7 40 10 20 joAl AoocMcx-i i. beta i uuO BOYS (1 55), (4.20). 7 00. 9 10 PG13 TWISTER (11 30), (300), (5:401, 730 820,1020.1100 PG13 CRAFT -112 30) (3 101.

(5 30), 8:10 BARB WIPE -(2 301. 720 PALLBEARER -(1O0), (3 20). (5 50) 800. 30 PG13 GREAT WMTTl HYPE -(140), (4 30), 8:50,950 LAST DANCE -6 30 900 MULMOLLANO FALLS (1 20) fl SUNSET PARK (12001 15001 9 40 TRUTH ABOUT CATS AND DOGS- (12:104, (240). (5 10), 7 45 WOO PG-13 OUST-(1iO 040) 600 830 PG13 JAMES AND THE GIANT PEACH-11250), (250).

(450) (4.40 PS PRIMAL FEAR (12 401. 13-30). 6:15, 920 BWOCAGt -14101 40 4TQ GREAT WMTTE HYPE-(2 151, (5001. 7:45,1020 LAST DANCE -(145) (4 301 715 9i0 SUNSETPARK-(1 151 14001 64S 920 OUEST 001. 12001.

451 4S 6 30 7 JO. 105, PG13 BWOCAGE JP1 '4 151 7-nn 15 BOYS -11451. 14 301,7 30. 10 00 PG13 BiPOCG '01? 9-45 Z.K 24 4 '5. 7JC.

i. 540. Wa PG-3 CRAFT -I' OOIO 301 620 900 PALLBEARER (12 451 '300 5 30) 7-45. 1OO0 PG'3 TRUTH ABOUT MIS AND OOGS-(12 30). (3 15).

(5 815 1020 PG-13 PRIMAL FEAR (1 401 1S1 7 30 10 i 1 lCW C0ifY pud' HiSVWO M. BU NTiSnO Tlfl I CJ I aoaiioo II II 64-6060 II mi "i g-rg 1 1 TsohZT 1 1 ui 1 1 "Is vi sT 1 1 s6 i vTdi 1 1 ijt mil im i pt UAnVtK3 NO PASSES Ofi DISCOUNT COUPONS Visit "Boyt" at http.