[KineJapan] The marketshare of Japanese films in Japan

[Kim Icreverzi]

I share Mark's first question and would be very interested to hear the 
response.

To Mark's last point(s) about cinema not being important in Japan (and I 
have a sneaking suspicion we've had a conversation along these lines in 
person at some point, Mark), I guess I'd like to push back against the 
quantitative argument and ask more about forms of cinephilia in Japan.  
My sense is that Mark's right when he says that it doesn't seem like the 
"general public" is picking up and seeing foreign films online instead 
and, as a result, you don't have this same demand for speed that Alex is 
talking about in the case of South Korea (is there also something here 
with respect to copyright enforcement or concerns about piracy?). 
Anecdotally, I know a number of cinephiles in Japan who insist on seeing 
things only in theaters and who, though they might like to see films 
sooner, also are prepared to wait to see them on the big screen.   Which 
is to say, that cinema for many of the cinephiles I know remains tied to 
the space of the theater.  And while those numbers might not be very 
large (ie those who persist in seeing movies in the theater, still often 
seeing double or triple bills) this sort of spectatorship is alive in a 
way that I feel like I see much more rarely in the US, where that sort 
of commitment to viewing conditions seems increasingly (framed) like a 
relic of the past.

Perhaps the other question that this might raise of foreign films, which 
relates again to Mark's question, is whether "foreign films" are going 
largely the way of the cinephile? [Also we should consider the way that 
cinema gets folded into the call to participate in 
domestic/national/nationalist forms of consumption in the wake of the 
disasters]
Kim

On 11/17/13 7:40 PM, Alex Zahlten wrote:
> Good points, Mark. To the clogged distribution pipeline I would add 
> another reason for the time lag for theatrical releases in Japan: 
> Because they can. Japan has been probably the most successful country 
> in the world in keeping online piracy (fairly) under control. This 
> means there is much less pressure for a day-and-date release that is 
> synchronized with the rest of the world. Compare this with South 
> Korea, where US films have to come out very soon after the US release 
> date simply because if they don't everyone will already have seen the 
> film online / downloaded it.
> Best,
> Alex
> *Gesendet:* Sonntag, 17. November 2013 um 21:19 Uhr
> *Von:* "Mark Roberts" <mroberts37 at mail-central.com>
> *An:* "Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum" 
> <kinejapan at lists.service.ohio-state.edu>
> *Betreff:* Re: [KineJapan] The marketshare of Japanese films in Japan
> So, a follow-up question would be: since Eiren is padding the numbers, 
> which sources give a better breakdown of /jishu eiga/, /pinku/, anime, 
> ODS, etc.? The Japanese Film Database has some of this information, 
> but not all.
> As for foreign films coming to Japan late, I have seen this again and 
> again. For international distribution, Japan is very often dead last 
> in the entire world.
> My hypothesis is that there are at least two things going on here.
> First, I suspect that foreign films "arrive" late in Japan because the 
> major distribution companies are giving priority to their stuff, and 
> there are not enough independent companies to pick up the slack. I 
> have heard people in distribution companies say that a major foreign 
> film was bought at Cannes, almost two years before it opened in 
> Tokyo. The second factor is simply that the general public are not 
> very engaged in new films. I don't have the impression that large 
> numbers of people are accessing films via the Internet. That kind of 
> culture seems more marginal here. Rather, people are just not watching 
> them at all. Frequentation statistics in theaters would seem to bear 
> this out.
> Simply put, compared to the US, the UK, France, South Korea and Hong 
> Kong, cinema just isn't very important in Japan today.
> M.
> On Nov 18, 2013, at 10:05 AM, Gregory Johnson wrote:
>
>     This is just a guess for which I have no proof, but I wonder if
>     the extent to which Japanese are watching foreign films without
>     going through the box office is rising. It takes a while for
>     foreign films to get to theaters in Japan. Many times I've already
>     seen something on an international flight before it appears here.
>     And despite various barriers, people often can access them on the
>     internet before they officially arrive. Are there any grounds for
>     this idea?
>
>     Greg Johnson
>     _______________________________________________
>     KineJapan mailing list
>     KineJapan at lists.service.ohio-state.edu
>     https://lists.service.ohio-state.edu/mailman/listinfo/kinejapan
>
>
>
> _______________________________________________
> KineJapan mailing list
> KineJapan at lists.service.ohio-state.edu
> https://lists.service.ohio-state.edu/mailman/listinfo/kinejapan

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://mailman.yale.edu/pipermail/kinejapan/attachments/20131117/04fb9246/attachment.html>
-------------- next part --------------
_______________________________________________
KineJapan mailing list
KineJapan at lists.service.ohio-state.edu
https://lists.service.ohio-state.edu/mailman/listinfo/kinejapan