Forum - View topicNEWS: Canada's Waterloo Fest Cancels Shinkai's Hoshi o Ou Kodomo
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GhostShell
Posts: 1009 Location: Richmond, B.C., Canada |
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Would love to learn what the reasons for the cancellation were. "Reasons beyond control" just doesn't say very much. I know if I were able to attend the fest, Shinkai's film would be one of the main reasons for going. Knowing Shinkai's work, FMA: The Sacred Star Of Milos isn't as close to being the same calibre, in my opinion. I'm sure there were many folks who were disappointed.
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TurboWasis
 Posts: 15 Location: Toronto, Ontario |
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I was there and they told us why but I'm not sure if we were supposed to share. The movie has been licensed by an unnamed North American company and that company would not let the festival play the movie because they hadn't been able to "review" and "approve" the materials that the festival would be playing. Apparently the Japanese company CoMix Wave approving it before the North American company licensed it wasn't good enough.
I am a HUGE fan of Shinkai's work and for me this was going to be the movie of the festival. I've had the opportunity in previous years to see the rest of his work at this festival and having my one and only chance to see his new movie in a theatre on a big screen taken away at the last minute is unbelievably disappointing. I know it's not the festival's fault, they tried really hard to work it out with the licenser so the movie could be played. There was a big turnout for the movie and there were people there who traveled a long way from Toronto (100km) for example just to see this one movie. I personally travel 100km each way just to attend this festival every year. There was lots of disappointment. |
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kakoishii
Posts: 741 |
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That was real dick move by the american licensors then. I mean seriously, the american anime market is niche enough, why would you wanna upset a crowd of fans who literally came miles and miles just to see that one movie. That wasn't a smart move at all, they should have did everything within their power to make sure that the movie was shown and they missed an opportunity to promotes themselves as the american licensors for when the movie is released here. That's some bad karma right there. |
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GhostShell
Posts: 1009 Location: Richmond, B.C., Canada |
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Agreed, it wasn't a smart move by the N.A. licence holder, especially considering the popularity of the director (Shinkai) and the movie, and the number of fans who showed up to attend the viewing. As you say, they missed a great opportunity to announce the licence. It will be interesting to see if there is a press release in the coming days from the N.A. company who now holds the licence. At least then we will be able to know who put on the brakes. Will also be interesting to see if they encounter any awkward (for them) questions related to the incident. |
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samuelp
Industry Insider
Posts: 2231 Location: San Antonio, USA |
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Just in case anyone is wondering:
It's unfortunately but that's the way licensing works: You sell the rights to distribute and show a film in a certain territory to another company. You can't just go in after making that deal and start screening it yourself, even for free. CMF was probably stuck between getting someone to license the bluray and holding up their previous commitment to screen the film, and there wasn't enough to time work out the money between the companies (a little money passed around and all would be good, I think). if the licensor really wants to make things up to people (and get some good free advertising), they should offer anyone who went to the film festival a coupon for the blu-ray. |
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Blood-
 Bargain Hunter Posts: 23769 |
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I really sympathize with all those audience members who ended up being disappointed. In hindsight, I was lucky I didn't even know about the screening because I probably would have been one of those Toronto types who would have gone just for that show.
It's unclear to me who really is at fault here. Seems to me it could be the festival organizers. If you advertise a film you better be sure you have all the proper clearances for it. Unless their arrangements were made before the title got licensed in NA. I wonder if Disney is the NA distrib? They're infamous for being real Nazis on anything to do with copyrights. |
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blkmage
 Posts: 2 Location: London, Canada |
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That is exactly what happened as the organizers explained it. They were apparently contacted about this on Friday night and were trying to make whatever arrangements necessary to show the film all the way up until Saturday night/Sunday morning. I can't really fault the organizers for anything and I appreciate that they were very specific as to the cause of the cancellation, going through the steps that they needed to go through to be allowed to screen the film and why they couldn't. It's a huge disappointment, especially since it was over something so petty. If I decide to buy it, I'll be importing the Japanese BD (which is conveniently English subbed) instead of buying it from whoever licensed it. Also, the reason the FMA movie was chosen was because they asked us which movie we wanted to see out of the ones they'd already screened. Last edited by blkmage on Mon Nov 21, 2011 9:35 pm; edited 1 time in total |
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Blood-
Bargain Hunter Posts: 23769 |
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Ah interesting. Sounds like a case of bad luck/timing. My copy of the Japanese LE import will be released in a few days and I can't wait. Would be awesome to see on the big screen, though.
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Mohawk52
 Posts: 8202 Location: England, UK |
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I think someone missed the boat when they licenced it for NA which must include Canada by default. the Japanese must think Canada is a part of the US.
Still if the Canadian approval was given before the US license, it should still count and not be superseded. Besides what, if anything in a Shenkei movie, could possibily need previewing for content approval anyway? Sounds more like a lame excuse to halt the viewing to me, or they have confused the word "Kodomo" with another infamous anime with the same name in it's title and they just want to cover their arses.
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WFAC
Posts: 6 Location: Waterloo, Ontario, Canada |
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This is Joseph Chen, the curator and the founder of the Waterloo Festival.
We were as disappointed as any of our fans, if not more, with not being able to execute the screening yesterday. In defense of the licensee, the legal frameworks for licensing any film or intellectual property is highly variable and can be highly complex. The decision cannot have been easy. We were beaten by red tape. I am certain that the licensee will be doing its very best to bring this beautiful and eagerly-awaited film to you, the fans, in the very best way that it possibly can, as soon as it possibly can. Let us all look forward to enjoying this film soon! |
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hikaru004
 Posts: 2306 |
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I bet that whoever has it is planning to screen it in theaters and the festival screening would conflict in some way.
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dragonrider_cody
Posts: 2541 |
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It's hard to say what the issues may have been. Don't forget that this is ComixWave property and they always seem to have "issues" surrounding their licenses, such as producing a new dub for 5cm Per Second, or refusing to allow blurays outside Japan recently. It's possible the North American distributor may have had no choice due to their contract.
Considering the number of ComixWave titles they've been nabbing the past year, I wouldn't be suprised if Sentai had nabbed it. If not them, then the most likely candidate would be Funimation. |
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mercurycc
Posts: 3 |
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This might not be as bad as people thought. The DVD is out by now so you can watch the film anywhere.
However if you have seen Tales of Earthsea, you would probably be disappointed by it. The same will happen if you expect a reasonable amount from Hoshi o Ou Kodomo. There is no reason why Shinkai all by himself could not make this film a good one. I would rather believe he is affected by some reason out of his control. But, Hoshi o Ou Kodomo is busted. |
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