[KineJapan] RIP Roger Macy

[Eija Niskanen]

I met Roger several times both in Japan, and at Berlinale film festival,
where I remember sitting over beers with him. He was a true enthusiast, and
the world and Japanese cinema need those.
Eija

On Fri, Oct 24, 2025 at 2:10 PM Earl Jackson via KineJapan <
kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:

> Dear Alexander,
> Thank you for letting us know the sad news of Roger Macy's death. His love
> of Japanese cinema was as boundless as his enthusiasm. He threw himself
> into the appreciation of these films with a fervor rarely seen and
> certainly underappreciated. A wonderful eccentric whose sincerity was as
> disarming as it was refreshing. May his memory be a blessing.
> ej
>
> Earl Jackson
> Professor, Emeritus
> National Chiao Tung University, Taiwan
> Associate Professor, Emeritus
> University of California, Santa Cruz, the US
>
>
> On Fri, Oct 24, 2025 at 7:02 PM Alexander Jacoby via KineJapan <
> kinejapan at mailman.yale.edu> wrote:
>
>> Dear all,
>>
>> I thought members of KineJapan might wish to be informed of the death of
>> Roger Macy, who often posed queries and engaged in discussion about
>> Japanese film via this mailing list. His son, who I don't know personally,
>> contacted me the other day by text to share the news.
>>
>> Roger was a true enthusiast, whose interest in Japanese film and Japan in
>> general stemmed in part from family matters; his daughter had settled and
>> married in the country. He took his enthusiasm seriously and engaged in his
>> own private research into Japanese cinema. His opinions about the films he
>> watched and discussed were sometimes eccentric, even at times infuriating,
>> but always stimulating, and he was a source of entertaining and
>> knowledgeable conversation.
>>
>> Although he had no academic post, he regularly travelled to conferences
>> and lectures on film and Japan-related themes, and voyaged across Britain,
>> to Paris and to the Cinema Ritrovato Festival in Bologna to see rare
>> movies. Alas, this year he was not able to go to Bologna. When I visited
>> him last month in the nursing home to which his final illness confined him,
>> he was still lamenting that fact, as well as the failing eyesight which now
>> prevented him from watching films.
>>
>> To many people on this list he will have been a name rather than a face,
>> and others will have known him only slightly. For anybody who knew him
>> well, the funeral will be on Saturday 8th November in London; I'm happy to
>> share details if messaged off-list.
>>
>> Best wishes,
>>
>>
>> Alexander Jacoby
>> (Senior Lecturer in Japanese Studies, Oxford Brookes University)
>> alexanderjacoby at brookes.ac.uk
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>>
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-- 
Eija Niskanen
Programming director
Helsinki Cine Aasia, March 14.-17.2024
www.helsinkicineaasia.fi
+358-50-355 3189
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