[KineJapan] ORTHOchromatic SHIN GODZILLA?

Thu Jun 20 11:40:47 EDT 2024

 Thanks for clarifying this Alexander. Hope the NY screening goes well. Unlikely to see it here. -ONE did surprisingly well here but on the lure of the GODZILLA franchise brand; the suburban Sydney multiplex audience I saw it with was bewildered by the 1950s Japanese setting and political and historical references, and couldn't wait for the film to get on with the monster-mashing. Whereas my sentiments were in inverse proportion.

You've got me thinking about the state of 35mm filmmaking in Japan. 
Post the Digitial Intermediate's emergence in the mid-2000s, but pre-the DCP mass rollout in 2012, a common feature film workflow globally was 35mm camera neg > digital scanning > DI > filmrecorder out to 35mm release print. DCP changed the last step, but 35mm negative originated productions are still more common than realised (I saw two features straight from Cannes at my local film festival last night, one Indian, one Portuguese; both had been shot on 35mm, speckle and all). That being said, even Nolan isn't making film intermediates, no matter his allegiance to shooting and releasing on film. 

Remembering that Yamada Yoji was still shooting film (I believe that's the case also for last year's KONNICHITA, KASAN?)  a quick google found an article from 2019 about Tokyo Laboratory Tokyo Genzōsho still at work (but looking pretty 1980s from the photos) pre-COVID: Tokyo Laboratory remains a stalwart champion of analog film production. But the Anime News reported late last year that current owners Toho were closing it, mentioning that Toho was going to form a new restoration lab along the lines of US studios like Sony and Universal:  Tokyo Laboratory Shuts Down in November, Works to Return Film Originals. This Reddit thread follow-up reports that there has been the usual nightmare of an old film film lab suddenly closing, with stored but orphaned negs potentially getting dumped because clients can't be located: https://www.reddit.com/r/DataHoarder/comments/16e0lk3/tokyo_lab_which_archived_many_old_anime_since/
The Japan Times also ran a piece late last year on surviving 35mm mini-theatres, with a focus on The Royal in Gifu, north of Nagoya, the last surviving 35mm-only commercial cinema, now just showing Showa-era films: Mini-theater showing 35mm films is struggling to survive. It seems to still be in business. Google says The Royal is currently running sessions of Segawa Masaharu's 1978 KIGEKI YAKUSHA-TACHI: SOOPER TO GABBLE,  a film featuring comedian Tamori I know nothing about, beyond this Tiktok fan video here: タモリさん主演映画『喜劇役者たち 九八（クーパー）とゲイブル』（1978年）.
QT.

    On Thursday, 20 June 2024 at 11:01:29 pm AEST, Alexander Fee <adfee96 at gmail.com> wrote:  

 Hi Quentin,
Of course! I should also add, as I realize it's not clear, that I'm the film programmer for Japan Society. I'd guess this is best seen as a digital emulation of orthochromatic. It would require a lot of funding to do the orthochromatic photochemically, so while IMAGICA may have the ability, it's ultimately a question of whether Toho would see the value in these analog processes - something I'd be unsure of. It's very rare nowadays to see any contemporary Japanese films shot on 35mm, much less have new 35mm prints struck unfortunately. I believe ORTHO has only been distributed digitally.
Best,Alexander

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Alexander Feeadfee96 at gmail.com | 513.473.2232 | alexanderfee.com

On Wed, Jun 19, 2024 at 10:00 PM quentin turnour <unkleque at yahoo.com.au> wrote:

 Alexander - thank you so very much. You've satisfied my curiosity. 
The NY Japan Society screening is on DCP, so there has to have been a Digital Intermediate made. And for all the talk of 'film' in your translation, my guess is that the whole thing was done in the digital post- realm, rather than any optical-chemical lab work being involved. But Japanese film labs still like to experiment (someone from Imagica is always appearing at film archiving conferences with a paper on their latest research in film colour restoration science that's hard to follow but rewarding if you can). So I wonder if there was any release of the ORTHO version in Japan on 35mm film, although I have no idea how many commercial venues there can still run 35mm. And if so, whether the release screening print stock was actually orthochromatic? That would be fascinating, although the same(-ish) effect can be achieved in the Digital Intermediate, then laser film recorder-outputted to a normal modern 35mm stock.
Thanks also for alerting me to a MINUS ONE MINUS COLOR version of Yamazaki's -ONE. I had no idea, but the Wiki article on the film now devotes a full section to its January release in Japan, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Godzilla_Minus_One&action=edit§ion=18 with a reference to discussion at one point about integrating colour and B&W in the style of Kuriosawa's TENGOKU TO JIGOKU.
QT.

    On Thursday, 20 June 2024 at 01:54:33 am AEST, Alexander Fee via KineJapan <kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:            

 Hi Quentin,
Orthochromatic was originally released in advance of Minus One's release (it can be surmised that the Minus One Minus Color version came as a result of Ortho). Minus One director Yamazaki was asked to select his favorite Godzilla films and present them as a leadup to Minus One. When Anno was asked to attend the screening of Shin Godzilla (also selected by Yamazaki), he proposed this Ortho version. The actual process they undertook is not entirely clear, but the project was overseen by Shinji Higuchi and Katsuro Onoue. The Japanese announcement of Ortho described orthochromatic as (this is a DeepL translation FYI) "a type of black-and-white film with a characteristic of not being sensitive to reddish colors. It is characterized by a heavier face tone than panchromatic film, the current mainstream monochrome film, and we aimed for this texture and incorporated it into the title." (https://eiga.com/news/20231003/9/). 
Best,Alexander
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Alexander Feeadfee96 at gmail.com | 513.473.2232 | alexanderfee.com

On Wed, Jun 19, 2024 at 7:31 AM quentin turnour via KineJapan <kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:

Just seen the NY Japan Society announce that they will internationally premiere the 'ORTHOchromatic' version of the 2016 franchise's re-re-re-re-re-...boot here: Shin Godzilla: Orthochromatic (Encore)

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Shin Godzilla: Orthochromatic (Encore)

Hideaki Anno and Shinji Higuchi’s 21st century masterpiece is reborn with this stunning black-and-white version....
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 Does anyone know it the rationale for this - beyond mere novelty and a market ploy / excuse to re-release - has been explained in the Japanese press? 
Japanese film labs have a great tradition of pioneering creative optical-chemical film processes. Bleach-bypassing is just one. So I though for a moment that this might be the revival of a past process used on a Toho release in the past. There's also the argument Dr. George Miller made when he re-released FURY ROAD in grey scale; because that's how he saw the film in his head, in development. But B&W FURY ROAD emphasised the gleaming silvers and chiaroscuro. 

This is not so explicable. If it reflects an old-school film process you'd hope for a Christopher Nolan-style 70mm film re-release, which is back in fashion in the US with VistaVision and similar 1950s big screen format originals getting restorations (like the new version of THE SEARCHERS). But this is appearing only on DCP. 
Obvious, also SHIN GODZILLA is a contemporary-set film, and stands out in the franchise for playing in the field of post 3/11 Japanese social commentary. Surely a 1950s B&W Tohoscope sort of retro feel would be better applied to the newer, overtly retro GODZILLA -1?
Finally and weirdest of all: Is this really Orthochromatic? English-language marketing is being coy about what this actually means, but silent film- and early photography historians will know its the old, pre-1922 B&W film process, which basically could only see blue and green colours in the spectrum, and explaining why pre-mid 1920s silent films are often drab, often have dense daylight shadows, little detail in clear blue sky, and coal-black reds. (This Wiki on this does a better job explaining this than me (and I like that the photo they use to illustrate what it did to Union Jacks features the famous Australian explorer Douglas Mawson): Orthochromasia - Wikipedia. This other Wiki explains why panchromatic film can see the whole spectrum: Panchromatic film - Wikipedia. 

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Panchromatic film - Wikipedia

A panchromatic emulsion renders a realistic reproduction of a scene as it appears to the human eye, although wit...
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Orthochromasia - Wikipedia

In spectral terms, orthochromasia refers to maintaining the position of spectral peaks, while metachromasia refe...
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So are Toho merely playing with an English loan word they hope no one in Japan actually understands? Is this meta-play with some corner of GODZILLIA or Toho history? Does the ortho, missing colour-specturm aesthetic make this a movie-going experience I need to have (per this article, which acknowledges ortho's charms using modern stocks: Orthochromatic vs Panchromatic film - A Photo Comparison

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Orthochromatic vs Panchromatic film - A Photo Comparison

Trevor Lee

This history of B&W film as it evolves from Orthochromatic to Panchromatic
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 )? 
Or is it all just hype?

Quentin TurnourNational Archives of Australia / Cinema Reborn Film Festival, Sydney.

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