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INTEREST: Takeshi Kitano is Critical of the Japanese Film Industry and Miyazaki

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If Anime wasn't creative, it would have never been popular to begin with. It would have never spread outside of Japan, and people wouldn't have bothered learning the language to translate anything out of it. Dragon Ball Z wouldn't have taken off, and Toonami wouldn't have existed to begin with. Nobody would have mentioned anime in American pop-culture, and everyone would not care. But that seems contrary to your assertion

Creativity is not the main concern, especially not in anime. It is first and foremost popular entertainment. It is true that in terms of creativity and sophistication it dared to tread new areas that in western animation are the target of the underground, at best, but i think that most people who watch anime are watching it first for the emotional connection/aesthetic of the characters and the plot/narrative and only then for the intellectual message and artistic merit. First style then substance. All this should be obvious though.

I agree a bit... the last live action Japanese film that I saw at a cinema in Australia not during a film festival was "Norwegian Wood". Last live action Japanese movie on video that I saw was Space Battleship Yamato 2199.

We've just had http://japanesefilmfestival.net/ and I saw both Thermae Romae movies.

Usually I just watch live action Japanese movies on the plane to and from Japan.

Anime movies get shown here at events like http://www.reelanime.com/ and http://www.studioghibli.com.au/

Toonami wouldn't have existed to begin with.

I dunno about lunch mobs, but apparently assaults are a thing in the bigger cities.

So, excuse me for the ignorance, but what is the "true" situation?

mdo7 wrote:

I've been watching Japanese films recently and they really lag behind not only Hollywood, but also Korean and Chinese films too.

Japanese cinema lags behind Japanese cinema of fifty years ago. If you look at the Japanese films released in the Criterion Collection -- and not just Kurosawa, but Onibaba, Kwaidan, Sword of Doom, or anything by Ozu -- it's hard to believe they're from the same country whose modern film industry seems to be a welfare system for pop idols.

Kitano is far-rightist, while Miyazaki is a leftist though. So they both hate modern Japan ( I am pretty sure that Miyazaki also hates "old" Japan ), but for different reasons.

Well there is still Kooreda Hirokazu his films are wonderful.

MetalUpa1014 wrote:

You could even argue they're more anti-gay than they are here in the US.

Until Japan has lynch mobs for homosexuals like we do, I don't see how. And that problem only seems to be increasing every year here, sadly.

Maidenoftheredhand wrote:

Well there is still Kooreda Hirokazu his films are wonderful.

He is still one of the few good directors left in Japan that make good films.

BTW, nearly all animation owes something to Disney as it was an early pioneering company. The majority of anime directors will probably tell you that Disney was an influence. Even if you don't like their films now like me, you can't deny their importance to animation.

The way that films are made in Japan may be to blame.

Most commercial films are produced by TV networks and other media companies in a system of “production committees” (or seisaku iinkai) in which partners share investment, PR and other chores in return for a share of the profits. Six or eight partners, ranging from video distributors to radio broadcasters and advertising agencies, is common. And 12 partners is not uncommon.

“A lot of these so-called producers (on the production committee) are not film people and don’t know how to read a script,” adds Inoue. “In a film you can say a lot without words, but these guys don’t get that. And when they say ‘I don’t understand,’ someone has to add explanations to the script. The film becomes longer — and more boring.”

Another reason for the bloat in Japanese commercial films, says Inoue, is their origin in material from other media, including door-stopper bestsellers and long-running comics. “The publishers have too much power,” he explains. “They demand faithfulness (to the original material) and no one tries to fight them.” It didn’t always used to be this way, he adds. “Directors used to have fierce battles with creators (of original material), but that’s no longer the case. Everyone is just trying to get along.”

Japanese audiences, typically a patient group, will show up for long-winded, defanged pics, but foreign audiences are less tolerant. “These self-censored films have never been accepted by the overseas market,” says Takamatsu. “The free creativity seen in films by Miike, Kitano, Sono and others has produced better results overseas.”

Unlike Western producers, Japanese producers usually are businessmen who haven't gone to film school, and don't feel comfortable telling a director "this scene doesn't work with that music" or "this scene drags and needs to be cut down." Which is nice to a point, but there are definitely times where someone in charge saying things like that might really help.

While some argue that with such a big domestic market, the Japanese biz can afford to regard foreign sales as simply the mint after the banquet, Takashi Nishimura, who as managing director of UniJapan is responsible for promoting Japanese film abroad thinks differently.

“(The Japanese film industry feels) a sense of crisis that the domestic market is no longer enough,” Nishimura said last year at the Intl. Film Festival of India in Goa. “But Japanese films are made only for Japanese.”

He was greeted and quizzed by eight prize-winning student filmmakers, and then lauded by Cannes festival selector Christian Jeune and critic and Asian film expert Tony Rayns.

Rayns echoed Kitano’s commentary about restrictiveness of mainstream Japanese cinema today. “The future of commercial cinema is in the hands of only a few companies. Opportunities for independents may become limited. But other channels will probably emerge [for new filmmaking voices], on the Internet, and through downloading.”

Asked to compare current Japanese cinema with that of Korea, Rayns drew a very unflattering portrait.

"Korea is very dynamic, it is undergoing social and political change. Its culture reflects that. Its films are rooted in change,” Rayns said. “In Japan I don’t see that. I see stasis. I still see same right wing politicians denying the existence of comfort women, the same old stuff we’ve heard for 20, 30 or 40 years. Until we see some challenge to the establishment [in Japan] I don’t think you will see the same dynamism as in Korean cinema.”