Mamoru Oshii's AVALON and Ghibli gibberings

[A. M. Nornes]

At 8:14 PM +0000 10/28/01, Jasper Sharp wrote:
> The turnout was pretty impressive, and I'm hoping that the seasons
> enthusiastic reception proves to Miramax that there is a sizeable market for
> this sort of thing in the UK, and that MONONOKEHIME is not the only film to
> go on to garner a subsequent DVD/video release.

Here is a quote from a recent LA Times article on Miramax and Hong Kong
cinema that made me think of their relationship to Ghibli.

"Miramax also recently bought "Flying Dragon, Leaping Tiger," one of the
many low-budget "Crouching Tiger" knock-off films. But weinstein insists
that he will change the film's title and release it only in video. "I simply
bought [it] as a way of policing the market," he says. "It will have a title
that won't be in any way perceived as a rip-off of 'Crouching Tiger.'"

"The Dragon is Hidden No Longer," by Patrick Goldstein, LQ times october 16,
2001.

What he's talking about is ensuring that no films compete with his rerelease
of "Iron Monkey." I couldn't help thinking of the conspiracy theories in the
anime community that claim they bought up all the rights to Ghibli as a
preemptive strike against the Disney competition. This quote gives some
substance to the fact that this kind of thing is not unknown in Hollywood
film history.

Markus