"The Princess Mononoke"(Mononoke Hime) claims
victory over Spielberg
mo-saito's TOKYO MOVIE REPORT#8（97/9/3）
Press conference for the mega hit of "The Princess Mononoke" was held on September 2, 5:15 p.m. at Imperial Hotel in Tokyo. The Executive Producer Yasuhiro Tokuma(President of Tokuma Publishing), storywriter / screenwriter / director Hayao Miyazaki, and distributor / exhibitor, Toshihiko Ishida (President of Toho) attended the conference. This conference is to announce that "The Princess Mononoke" has become #1 for Japanese film rental record beating past #1 film "Nankyoku Monogatari"(Antarctica). Despite the this fact's colored front page article which was already on the Asahi News evening edition on the same day, the press gathered to comment on how this film fascinated the wide audience.
Yasuhiro Tokuma: Ever since I quit Yomiuri newspaper at the age of 28, I have repeatedly failed or bankrupt my companies for 8 times. Now I am very pleased to say that I finally received the laurel. I would like to thank Director Miyazaki and Producer Suzuki for their continued support. Our next objective is to beat the record of "Jurassic Park" of 10.5 million of admission and 8.3 billion yen of film rentals. Our final objective is to beat Spielberg's "E.T."'s record in Japan. "E.T." has #1 record for its 9.6 billion yen's film rental (Japan's #1 record for all movies). I know we have to. "E.T."'s adomission was 12 million. "Mononome"'s objective is 12.5 million. This record will not be broken till 21st or 22nd Century. The objective figure is 12.5 million of admission and 10 billion yen of film rental. As for overseas business, Disney executives have already reviewed on August. They seemed to be overwhelmed by the film. The meeting with them will be held on Sep. 5 to plan a U.S. release hopefully in March 1998.
Soundtrack sale is also good. Album sales is 269,000 and single sales 321,488. I have been receiving inquiries from foreign journalists wanting to know the reason of huge hit. I don't think it's necessary to analyze the reason. I would like to start analyzing the result on an aspect overlooking Asia, including the hit records of Taipei and Hong Kong as well as Japan.
Toshihiko Ishida: "The Princess Mononoke" has achieved 8.77 million of admission and 11,949 million yen of box office gross as of August 31, after 51 days in release. Asahi newspaper's article of "7.3 billion yen of film rental" is not the final result. I will estimate that the final figure will be 12.5 million of admission and 10 billion yen of film rental which is the same figure that Mr. Tokuma mentioned. Thanks to "The Princess Mononoke", Toho's 6 month business result showed the new record. Souvenir program sales in theatres made 2.25 million . Merchandise sales in the theaters is expected to be 700 to 800 million yen.
Hayao Miyazaki: The reason of this huge hit...., I can't judge. After I finished production of this movie and delivered to the distributor/exhibitor, I leave the rest up to them. However when I received a call from Producer Suzuki, and he told me that it "paid off", I was so glad to hear the news. I am not interested in breaking records when I make movies. But I do believe that the most important thing a movie-maker should keep in mind is to return the money owed to investers, rather than creativity. If we don't return the money to the investers, the next generation of film makers will not be able to gather the money. So I am very happy that this film paid off.
The conference was very good atmosphere. Mr. Tokuma said; "There had been requests to Director Miyazaki from Warner Bros. and Steven Spielberg to make movies together. However I turned them down because our company signed a contract with Disney." "The Princess Mononoke" is now releasing 250 theathers nationwide.
The followings are weekly results;
Week Admission Box Office(Yen)
1st(Jul. 12-18) 1,100,038 1,100,038
2nd(Jul. 19-25) 1,104,817 1,517,196,000
3rd(Jul. 26-Aug. 1) 1,226,074 1,603,939,000
4th(Aug. 2-8) 1,213,179 1,620,774,000
5th(Aug. 9-15) 1,472,247 2,104,903,000
6th(Aug. 16-22) 1,187,127 1,638,793,000
7th(Aug. 23-29) 1,069,978 1,462,186,000
8th weekend(Aug. 30,31) 396,957 554,829,000
Total 8,770,417 11,949,221,000
1 theater recorded over 300 million yen of BOG, 1 theater was 250 million, 2 theaters was 200 million, 9 theaters was 150 million and 17 theaters was100 million.
Katsuhiro Otomo, director of "Akira" and Mamoru Oshii, director of "Kokaku Kido Tai/Ghost in the Shell" announced their new films at a press conference held on October 28. Journalists showed an interest for their new films "STEAM BOY"(Otomo) and "G.R.M"(Oshii) as well as thier projects framework.
Both pictures will be co-produced by Bandai, one of the biggest toy companies in Japan, Bandai Visual, subsidiary of Bandai and Sunrise, an animation production company. Bandai announced that both films are at the first stage for "Digital Engine Project". According to Shigeru Watanabe, chairman of Bandai Visual, "Digital means the newest technology, and Engine means on-going technology". The final goal for this project is "Aiming the worldwide market utilizing the advanced Japanese animation, i.e., "Japanimation". Our slogan is "Let's catch up to Hollywood someday". "STEAM BOY" is an animation movie with a production cost of 1.6 billion yen using CGI, and "G.R.M"'s production cost will be 2.4 billion yen. "G.R.M." will be combination of live, special effect, CG and animation combining digital technology. Shinji Higuchi of "Gamera" and "Gamera 2" will be the special effects director. The objective for Bandai is merchandising, video cassette sales, TV game sales, TV on-air right sales as well as theater release. "Video sales is estimated at 2 billion yen and game will be 6 billon yen per picture. These figures are the highest estimates", said Mr. Watanabe. He also announced that several distribution companies have already offered thier international sales.
Both Otomo and Oshii showed strong ambition toward this project. "This film's budget alone is bigger than the total amount spent on all of my past films", said Oshii. Oshii also commented to a question on how to combine the different types of visuals; "Basically, I will proceed with the animation production way. The first priority is my animation sensibility. The current Japanese films exceed Hollywood creations in the fields for character creation, sense of mechanical layout, and sophisticated taste for animation. I cannot determine the progress for digital technology in the year 2000 which this movie will be completed, however, I am quite sure that the audience would have had enough dinosaurs and volcanos making panic in people's towns by then. Even in such time, the area in which Japan can take lead will be in the world of animation."
This project aims to step into the world market utilizing the unique animation culture in Japan. Is it too early to invest much money? Or is this the first step for worldwide business? The answer will be the next century.