Date of a Film

[Aaron Gerow]

>What is the general rule in dating films in scholarly writing and
>in the movie world?  Any comment on this issue is appreciated.

This is certainly an important issue when it comes to writing on recent 
cinema.  Unlike the days of the studio system, when films were made with 
a release date in mind, usually only weeks after completion, many films, 
especially independent films, have to wait months if not a year before 
getting released (in part due to the oligopoly in distribution).

I personally prefer to use the release date of the film because that is 
when the film assumes to a fullest extent its status as a film (as they 
say in theory, a film is not a film unless it has been seen).  While 
certainly festival audiences may have seen it earlier, I think one should 
privilege general audiences over those more privileged ones.  Dating it 
from the release date also helps scholars and others who, when looking at 
our work, want to check on film reviews and other texts from when the 
film came out.  I see no reason to date a film 1998 that showed at one 
minor festival in December 1998 when it went into general release to 
great success in May 1999.  If it is important, a footnote can be added 
noting the early appearance of the film in festivals.  I note that the 
Internet Movie Database clearly makes date of release the official date 
of the film (now they have it so that if you want to correct the year of 
the film, you have to give them the date of release).

Note there is also the issue of copyright.  From what I can tell, 
practice over what date to use when copyrighting seems varied.  While 
some films, like Ishii Takashi's _Kuro no tenshi vol. 2_ have not been 
released yet bear a 1998 copyright date, I have seen in December some 
films set for release after the New Year and the copyright year is for 
the next year.  That does cause confusion.  Some encyclopedias, when 
confronted with a difference between date of copyright/completion and 
date of release, prefer to list both.

Another issue, of course, is when a film can be considered "complete," 
especially when different formats and versions come out.  Do you redate a 
film because it was re-edited a bit after failing at a festival?  A film 
like _A_, for instance, seems to have several versions that have shown at 
different festivals and in public.  This is another reason that I think 
privileging the date of release is the way of causing least confusion.  
If clearly a work has been released on video before the theaters, that 
should be noted, but most of us do not date the films we discuss from the 
release date on video even when we use the video in our analyses.

Just some thoughts.

Aaron Gerow
Associate Professor
International Student Center
Yokohama National University
79-1 Tokiwadai
Hodogaya-ku, Yokohama 240-8501
JAPAN
E-mail: gerow at ynu.ac.jp
Phone: 81-45-339-3170
Fax: 81-45-339-3171