[KineJapan] Bohemian Rhapsody in Japan

[Paul Roquet]

I haven’t seen the film, but I did notice a bunch of stories in the Japanese press about Freddie’s ‘lifelong love for Japan,' with all kinds of wild speculation about why. Hard to say how much this drove the BO, but it’s a ready-made narrative for the news and probably ramped up the mythification aspect even further. Pictures of him eating eki-ben on the shinkansen also went viral on Twitter earlier this week: https://twitter.com/tsdebut/status/1077559411554410496

Paul

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Paul Roquet
Associate Professor of Japanese Studies
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
proquet.mit.edu<https://proquet.mit.edu>


On December 29, 2018 at 11:13:02, Gerow Aaron (aaron.gerow at yale.edu<mailto:aaron.gerow at yale.edu>) wrote:

On our last day in Portland, the family and I went to see Bohemian Rhapsody in the theater. I am not really a Queen fan; in fact my main interest was trying to think why this was such a huge hit in Japan. As of today, it’s made $55 million at the Japanese BO (with predictions it will go over $70 million), with Japan being the film’s third biggest non-US market (the South Korean BO numbers are higher, but it opened there earlier).

I did not like the film that much, for its mythification of Freddie and predictable direction, but I wonder why it has not only made a bunch at the Japanese BO, but also came in number 1 in Pia’s satisfaction survey for all of 2018.

My inclination is to look at both its melodrama and its depiction of family—and the promise of mass unity—but I was wondering what others think, or what others might have written about this.


Aaron Gerow
Professor
Film and Media Studies Program/East Asian Languages and Literatures
Director of Graduate Studies, Film and Media Studies
Yale University
143 Elm Street, Room 210
PO Box 208324
New Haven, CT 06520-8324
USA
Phone: 1-203-432-7082
Fax: 1-203-432-6729
e-mail: aaron.gerow at yale.edu<mailto:aaron.gerow at yale.edu>
website: www.aarongerow.com<http://www.aarongerow.com>

















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