a japanese film of sixties

[harry alim]

dear Aaron,

well i dramatized the thing to get the attention.

but back to early sixties, i can but offer a data of what happen as far i
remember.

it is hard for me to know which producer flood their product into java or
indonesia, but at least i can give some account about local moviegoers.

in the early sixties, indonesia population at about 90 million, 60 % of it
in java about 54 million. but although the population is quite huge but they
are not all moviegoers. by percentage chinese decent more moviegoers compare
to local, and then of educated class. by percentage educated class now
double than 40 years ago but still less than a certain percentage with
education higher than highschool .

in java 40 years ago javanese who can read and talk indonesian possibly less
than 50 % of its number now, considering that indonesia just formed within
less than 15 years, more javanese talked in javanese language  Compare to
local javanese, more chinese decent in java was able to talk in indonesian
language, as indonesian language has been the language in the house of
chinese decent even before indonesia was formed.

all film was not dubbed but with indonesian subtitle, which with such
demographic condition no wonders japanese movies with samurai and the like
more familiar or no cultural gap to moviegoers which comprise mostly of
chinese decent. But the demographic of moviegoers changed from year to year.

i can only remember the japanese movies screened in here more of samurai,
godzilla and mothra, some other science fiction on atom, bomb, war and of
easy to understand love story or drama. I can't remember there was any
Gamera or Daimajin, or even ghost or goblin movies, possibly none of them.

in the early sixties, american movies was imported and regulated by ampfaa,
but of japanese importer i do not know, at those times even shaw brothers
name has not been as big as it was after '65. also indian movies producer
has not been as big as it was after '75.

in the early sixties, more javanese still prefer to watch wayang (shadow
play) a local traditional play or listen to radio of same wayang in javanese
language, hence this kind of taste basically dictated what kind of film a
producer should imported.

but the existence of popularity of japanese samurai film among kids showed
to us that this kind of film was accepted by moviegoers, with  a note that
the acceptance was only within chinese community and kids of city dwellers
and of educated families, as no kids of villagers staged the same samurai
like war as kids of city dwellers did.

one famous chinese martial art writer in hong kong was also influenced by
japanese samurai, one of his earlier writing influenced by rashomon like way
of story telling, although in the later development this chinese writer
developed his own way of story telling and become famous not only among
chinese decent communities in east asia and south east asia, but also among
local.

no doubt that in the later day once the japanese samurai genre movies
dropped its influx, shaw brothers was becoming one of and the biggest film
producer flooded south east asia with martial art movies.

it seems important to note that japanese samurai movies was only popular
among kids, boys not girls below seventeen, for the adult, or after
seventeen, they prefer american movies, american dream, american teenager
drama. occasionally one japanese teen drama was screened, but they was not
available in enough quantity as far i remember. this segment was later
substituted by hong kong martial art, italian cowboy once the japanese
samurai influx dropped.


in the seventies, demographically javanese moviegoers changed, however as
the biggest chunk of moviegoers they prefer to see the movies with no hassle
on subtitle, local film then was on the rise.


regards, harry alim








>
> It is interesting that you attribute the influx of Japanese film to the
> post-Rashomon boom. That is usually considered an art-house phenomenon,
> but it is fascinating to think of its affects on even a place like
> rural Java. One possible way of thinking about this is the role of
> Daiei, and particularly Nagata Masaichi, in such cinematic trade. While
> films like Sansho Dayu were made in part with Western audiences in
> mind, Nagata enthusiastically eyed the Asian market and wrote numerous
> essays on the profits to be obtained there. Your mention of Rashomon
> and Zatoichi--both Daiei product--make me wonder whether many of the
> movies you see were not Daiei films, entering Java in part because of
> Daiei's active efforts to enter the Asian market. That would also
> explain in part why Japanese films disappeared in the 1970s, after
> Daiei went bankrupt. If you saw Godzilla, clearly other studios' films
> were being imported as well, but I wonder if you saw Daimajin or
> Gamera? Maybe some of the Daiei ghost and goblin films? Nikkatsu also
> did well in the Asian market, so I wonder if the youth films you saw
> were Nikkatsu films?
>
> With much discussion today about contemporary Japanese popular culture
> in Asia, it is clear more hard historical research needs to be done
> about earlier examples like this, and about such institutions like
> Daiei and Nagata.
>
> Aaron Gerow
> KineJapan owner
>
> Assistant Professor
> Film Studies Program/East Asian Languages and Literatures
> Yale University
>
> For list commands, send "information kinejapan" to
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>
>