Yasukuni article and interview with Li Ying

[Mark D. Roberts]

Thanks, Jasper, for sharing your take on 'Yasukuni' with us.

Being located in Tokyo, I'm also waiting to see the film. Over the  
past few days, rumors in the blogosphere now suggest that there  
*will* be perhaps one theater screening here, through the distributor  
is keeping quiet for now about which one to avoid further problems.

I'm curious if anybody has more information on why, exactly, the  
first five theaters here decided to drop the film? It doesn't seem  
that the public reservations expressed by Tomomi or the other LDP  
members who had the pre-screening were themselves actually decisive.  
A catalyst, perhaps, but not the smoking gun. Humax apparently  
received some threats via phone, presumably from uyoku, which they  
claim as the basis for their decision to drop the film, though they  
also deny "political pressure". In the Japan Focus interview, Li  
mentions that the theaters were taking out insurance, increasing  
security, etc., but he doesn't accept their claim that they decided  
to drop his film out of concern for the safety of the customers. I  
noticed that Shinjuku Wald's statement about their decision mentioned  
"concern for our neighbors", i.e., that the other businesses in the  
building might be affected by any 'trouble'.

So, is it a problem with insurance, some kind of liability for injury  
or harm to anybody in the theater building, even non-employees? Did  
the exhibitors cave because of the prospect of an invasion of sound  
trucks alone, for that would presumably cause problems for them with  
the building management, other tenants, etc.?

While it is easy to point fingers at the LDP in this mess, it seems  
that the more concrete problem is that the venues that initially  
signed up to show this film (and they must have had some idea that  
they'd be in for at least some threatening phone calls) capitulated  
to pressure from the ultra-right, and possibly for reasons that are  
purely economic. If so, very disappointing.

It is often said that the sound trucks are basically protected by the  
police, who selectively enforce laws about public disturbance while  
also invoking the "constitutional right to free speech" of the sound  
truck operators. It is also said that the groups behind the sound  
trucks have demanded payoffs from the businesses that they intimidate.

Does anybody know more about what happened in this case?

M