[KineJapan] Film fests of yore in Yurakucho/Hibiya

Mon Sep 21 15:58:55 EDT 2020

Thanks, Alex. Yes, sounds like a good idea for potential legwork…if you happen to run into anything I would be keen on hearing what you find. Nenpyo might be a very good source…

Also, contradictory to what I wrote earlier in response to Jonathan’s suggestion, I found that Seven Samurai was indeed programmed at the TIFF in 1991, but TIFF tends to be in Fall, whereas I am looking for something that happened in March...

I think of the Chanter as more Yurakucho-to-Ginza-esque, which is to say less polemic and more…postwar ruins and liberal arts (Yurakucho de aimasho, etc.)…if that makes sense. Where the cultured men in suits also go after hours, as that part of town is more well heeled than the Chuo-sen student radical minitheatres like Nakano or even Waseda. I’m not actually sure where their money initially came from, though I know the shopping arcade was a big draw. 

Online histories situate that theatre in terms of Takarazuka and Teikoku gekijo. I saw the Todd Haynes movie Carol there, and emerged out of the matinee literally into the middle of a Takarazuka fan gathering, waiting for someone/s…it makes me wonder what the insistence on programming/refusing The Bad Sleep Well was all about…and what did end up being programmed. 

But I am not sure how to class stand-alone (but perhaps embedded in department-store planning) theatres that are neither truly indie, independent, or mini…now of course it is a Toho cinema, so perhaps in a corporate history somewhere is a narrative about the switchover, where the legacy is recast as a forerunner of the new (I think there was a Godzilla Square, for a while…).

Anne

> On Sep 21, 2020, at 12:45, Zahlten, Alexander via KineJapan <kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:
> 
> Hi Anne,
>  
> This is a fascinating thread, thanks for bringing these questions in. Another place to look might be one of the many books on minitheater history, which sometimes can be pretty specific about what films played where at what time (sometimes organized in nenpyo), when which theater opened, audiences, etc.; obviously minitheaters are only a subsection of what was going on in that area, but it will provide some insights,
>  
> While I do have a number of these books I only have limited access to my office right now - but can check once I am able to get in to see if one of them might be useful to you.
>  
> All best,
> Alex
>  
> From: KineJapan <kinejapan-bounces at mailman.yale.edu> on behalf of Anne McKnight via KineJapan <kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu>
> Reply-To: Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum <kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu>
> Date: Monday, September 21, 2020 at 14:42
> To: "Jonathan M. Hall" <jonathanmarkhall at gmail.com>
> Cc: Anne McKnight <annekmcknight at gmail.com>, Japanese Cinema Discussion Forum <kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu>
> Subject: Re: [KineJapan] Film fests of yore in Yurakucho/Hibiya
>  
> Thanks Jonathan and Markus~
>  
> Fortunately, I only have to deal with actual empirical fact insofar as it helps me understand what Kurosawa is saying. 
> He says it was the Chanter (which maybe I should render Chanté in English-ish to capture the retro-elegance?) so his memory recall is what I am going with. His line is mostly rhetorical, I think—about situating himself in a mediascape where he has an identity that does not pander, is old-school in daring to be vulgar, etc…but I need to see the programming in the surrounding areas to make that call of where he is dragging his contrarian feet…
>  
> Markus, sadly, USC Library does not seem to have kept up the connection, as they only have 5 issues from 1979~81. Or it may well be that they have them in a pile somewhere, and they have not been catalogued. That reminds me that Rebecca Corbett has just started as librarian there and may well know...
>  
> What I am most concerned with is how that theatre sits in the cluster of theatres in that area, with their respective repertoires of both Japanese and foreign/“Western" films. In the way that, say Yosumi Shunya’s book on sakariba gives the general vibe of street/theatre life in various neighborhoods...
>  
> Indeed, PIA or TIFF archives would help me figure that out, as I could see what was regular programing, and what was special event/festival…
> TIFF on-line archive is interesting—also, a blast from the past to see the juxtapositions…
>  
> It doesn’t look like there was any kind of a Kurosawa fest at TIFF. No screening of his stuff at all from 1989~1992, while Obayashi, Kumai and Shindo all do have films. I did come across a really fascinating Satyajit Ray film that Kurosawa mentions, though (The Stranger/Agantuk), in the same taidan I am translating. 
>  
> Jonathan, at UCI library, PIA does not come up in a search, so are you suggesting I should skim through the film journals from 1990~1 or thereabouts to look at general news items?
>  
> All this for a footnote, if an intriguing one, and thanks for the resources!
>  
> Anne
> 
> 
>> On Sep 20, 2020, at 17:46, Jonathan M. Hall <jonathanmarkhall at gmail.com <mailto:jonathanmarkhall at gmail.com>> wrote:
>>  
>> Hi Anne,
>>  
>> I think TIFF was only six years old in 1991, and Kurosawa definitely presented at it in person that year. But was the Chanter the actual venue? I seem to remember it was one of them.
>>  
>> http://history.tiff-jp.net/en/overviews?no=4 <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=http-3A__history.tiff-2Djp.net_en_overviews-3Fno-3D4&d=DwMFaQ&c=WO-RGvefibhHBZq3fL85hQ&r=__ROkypPMfBMMPVia3CjGrxSJryXbwjGyfBDGhCKd68&m=1TeuSyQZ8XzKJo8jt0AE3fGzo8fyPX3FQdkXM5UCJqw&s=NEKTP77J5058rwf7loJX3eZ25exBPzeEokmbXGbQ9gg&e=>
>>  
>> If only these weren’t pandemic times, this might help:
>>  
>> https://findingaids.library.columbia.edu/ead/nnc-ea/ldpd_7755896/dsc/16 <https://urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__findingaids.library.columbia.edu_ead_nnc-2Dea_ldpd-5F7755896_dsc_16&d=DwMFaQ&c=WO-RGvefibhHBZq3fL85hQ&r=__ROkypPMfBMMPVia3CjGrxSJryXbwjGyfBDGhCKd68&m=1TeuSyQZ8XzKJo8jt0AE3fGzo8fyPX3FQdkXM5UCJqw&s=ftqQpK903PKArQLMOVhVS46UtbISndGIQkSIQffqq7s&e=>
>>  
>> I do remember a festival, but which one. 
>>  
>> By the way, one more local resource: UC Irvine has an excellent collection of film journals of the period, which I helped the library acquire through a NEAC grant. That would be the easiest place. And those periodicals are loanable. So a colleague there might request curbside loan for you if inter-library loan doesn’t work. 
>>  
>> With best wishes, 
>> Jonathan 
>> 
>> 
>> On Sunday, September 20, 2020, Anne McKnight via KineJapan <kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu <mailto:kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu>> wrote:
>>> Hi all~
>>>  
>>> I’m wondering if anyone who has pounded the pavements and darkened the doors of the theatres in the Yurakucho area might know of any film fests particularly associated with the Hibiya Chanter (日比谷シャンテ) theatre? 
>>> I ask because Kurosawa Akira was in about 1991 miffed that one of his films (The Bad Sleep Well) was not included at the retrospective of his films that screened there; he hints that it is too déclassé for the time and place. The whole Kurosawa feature was probably a part of a larger festival, as he does refer to a フェスティバル. 
>>> If I had access to PIA I would go back and look at the listings, but I don’t, so if anyone has a memory of being there or reading about festivals that took place in Hibiya, or strolling by the marquees even, I would very much enjoy hearing about these events.
>>>  
>>> Thanks!
>>>  
>>> Anne
> 
>  
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