Iwanami bankruptcy

[Aaron Gerow]

Not much response here to the Iwanami bankruptcy, but I thought I'd add a 
bit of news for those of you interested in this incident.

The president and one of the officers at Iwanami Productions held a news 
conference on Friday to discuss what will happen to the some 8000 films 
Iwanami has in its vaults (yes, there seem to be that many films).  They 
announced that they will try to find an institution or corporation to buy 
the 3000 best or most significant titles for the price of about 300 
million yen, someplace that would as part of the condition of sale, 
preserve and distribute the films.  If they cannot find such a buyer, 
they hope to at least organize a "preservation society" which would, on 
the basis of donations, try to preserve as many of the films as possible. 
 There was no word in the newspaper article about what would happen to 
the remaining 5000 films, but the documentary grapevine says that a large 
number of films will be adopted by the many production companies started 
by Iwanami veterans after they left the company.  There is concern, 
however, that many works will simply be dumped.

Aaron Gerow
Yokohama National University
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