Report : the Asian cinema in France in 2006
Hello my Bae sisters,Today I would like to share with you an interesting article I found about Asian cinema in France in 2006.
From : http://www.nihon-fr.com/cinema/afficher.php?page=dossiers&id=240&highlight=dorel
Written by Jean Dorel in February 3rd 2007
Translated from French to English by camille
Report : the Asian cinema in France in 2006
In 2005, 43 Asian movies were released on the screens totalising 3.244.351 entries. In 2006, the number of the movies released is obviously the same (38 movies) but the total of spectators dropped to 1.918.123. There are 648 movies released in France for a total of 188.045.725 spectators. So the proportion of the Asian cinema is approximately 1%.
The distribution by country is as follows: Japan 14 movies, China 10 movies, Korea 5 movies, HongKong 4 movies, Thailand 3 movies, Taiwan and Singapore 1 movie. However it should be added that on these 38 movies, not less than 7 were old feature movies never shown in France. Worse than that, the number of movies released simultaneously in their origin country and France in 2006 can be count with the fingers of a hand: The Host, Le Maître d’armes, Origin, Bashing and Paprika. Here we have, as an indication, the number of local movies released in their respective countries in 2006 : Japan: 116 movies, Korea: 107 movies, HongKong: 49 movies, Thailand: 32 movies, China: 21 movies, Taiwan: 18 movies.
From France, we would come to doubt that Asia produces movies. So, the two last Jackie Chan (The Myth and Rob B Hood) were not released. Movie directors like Hirokazu Kore-eda (Nobody knows) or Katsuhito Ishii (The Taste of tea) has each one shot a new movie (Hana for the first, Funky Forest for the second) but there isn’t any date of release scheduled in France. Same case for the new movies of Tsai Ming-Liang (I don’t want to sleep alone), Kim Ki-duk (Time) or Jia Zhangke (Still life) however used to be distributed. And I don’t dare to evoke others big popular successes which can only appear suspect to the eyes of some here.
But with that, there are explanations undoubtedly logical for a distributive company. The first one is the profitability which now is threatened by the excessive number of movies which are released in the movie theatres each week. Love of May, the only Taiwanese movie of the year was released in summer in only one Parisian copy. The examples in 2006 were numerous movies sacrificed or badly released (camille : did April Snow belong to this category ?) . From now on, it seems that it’s the new effective rule as has proved the little number of copies for the 2 movies Election of Johnnie To, however very expected.
The fear of the French distributors is also characterized by a tasting ideology. They have to guess spectators taste and that summarizes into especially not to innovate. The Asian cinema for some, is initially action movies (inevitably, the martial arts come from Asia) or contemplative cinema (they are Zen). Apart from some delightful surprises, some would believe that over there, they can only fight and meditate. They don’t know how to laugh, nor to love and even less to make police investigations. We can imagine that it must be difficult sometimes to negotiate the right of diffusion with the Asian companies (it seems that the Japanese companies are hard in business), but at this point, it is despairing. There is however a Movie Market each year in Cannes where the distributors make business.
If there were few movies in movie theatres in 2006, on the other hand all the movies which are interesting arrived directly in DVD. This tendency undoubtedly will be accentuated again and the spectator will have to pay his 20 € if he wants to discover an Asian movie. But here, the new practices are changing the movie-goer habit. The downloading seems the only way for the fan of Asian cinema. However, the principal editors of DVD (Pathé Asian Star, Metropolitan Video HK, Wild Side, Kubik) in France make great efforts for the visibility of the Asian cinema, but at that moment of DVD commercial recession, the price still seems prohibitive.
It would be a mistake to stigmatize only the distributors. The cinema criticism has also a large responsibility in this anaemia. How to bring the least credit of honesty to journalists who affirm before seeing movies that such festival will be succeeded by simply reading the list of the selection ? In 2007, the new movies of Hou Hsiao-hsien, Hong Sang Soo and Apichatpong Weerasetakul, directors for whom we had only few affinities till now, will be released in France. I bet that “official” criticism (Libération, Le Monde, Inrockuptibles, Cahiers du cinema) will make profit of their situation. We have to wait till the issue of the Cahier du cinéma of January 2007 to finally see the name of Pang Ho-cheung well written. Although several of his movies were presented in various French festivals. Better late than never. In 2007, the situation does not seem to progress and the same symptoms will undoubtedly give the same diseases. We only can hope…
Here for memory, the entries number of 38 Asian movies released in France in 2006.
1. Tom Yum Goong, l’honneur du dragon of Prachya Pinkaew (Thaïland) 374.977 entrées
2. Nausicäa de la vallée du vent of Hayao Miyazaki (Japan) new 287.670 entries
3. Le Maître d’armes of Ronny Yu (Hong Kong-China) 245.466 entries 4. Pompoko of Isao Takahata (Japan) new 236.916 entries
5. Wu Ji, la légende des cavaliers du vent of Chen Kaige (China-Hong Kong-Korea) 184.216 entries
6. The Host of Bong Joon-ho (Korea) 154.407 entries
7. April snow of Hur Jin-ho (Korea) 70.446 entries
8. Shanghai dreams of Wang Xiaoshuai (China) 35.632 entries
9. Kekexili, la patrouille perdue of Lu Chuan (China) 32.588 entries
10. A bittersweet life of Kim Jee-won (Korea) 30.772 entries
11. Voiture de luxe of Wang Chao (China) 29.831 entries
12. La Vie secrète de Madame Yoshino of Masaru Konuma (Japan) new 25.728 entries
13. Paprika of Satochi Kon (Japan) 25.712 entries
14. Duelist of Lee Myung-se (Korea) 22.128 entries
15. Nouvelle cuisine of Fruit Chan (Hong Kong) 19.983 entries
16. Takeshis’ of Takeshi Kitano (Japan) 19.078 entries
17. Origine of Keiichi Sugiyama (Japan) 19.029 entries
18. Le Samourai du crépuscule of Yoji Yamada (Japan) 17.722 entries
19. Citizen Dog of Wisit Sasanatieng (Thaïland) 12.019 entries
20. Kamikaze girls of Tetsuya Nakashima (Japan) 11.243 entries
21. Love of May of Hsu Hsiao-ming (Taiwan) 11.223 entries
22. Tony Takitani of Jun Ichikawa (Japan) 7.843 entries
23. Bashing of Masahiro Kobayashi (Japan) 5.292 entries
24. Mongolian pingpong of Lu Caodi (China) 5.491 entries
25. Vagues invisibles of Pen-ek Ratanaruang (Thaïland-Netherland) 4.714 entries
26. Passages of Yang Chao (China) 4.432 entries
27. 4 : 30 of Royston Tan (Singapour) 4.095 entries
28. Les 14 amazones of Cheng Kang (Hong Kong) new 3.690 entries
29. Perhaps love of Peter Chan (Hong Kong-China) 3.366 entries
30. Histoires du coin de la rue of Osamu Tezuka (Japan) new 2.309 entries
31. Chœur de Tokyo of Yasujiro Ozu (Japan) new 1.931 entries
32. Marathon of Jeong Yoon-chul (Korea) 1.679 entries
33. Un père à Pékin of An Zhanjun (China) 1.530 entries
34. Oxhide of Liu Jia-yin (China) 1.287 entries
35. Souvenirs d’enfance of Xu Geng (China) 1.330 entries
36. Vivre dans la peur of Akira Kurosawa (Japan) new 1.282 entries
37. La Nouvelle légende du grand judo of Akira Kurosawa (Japan) new 1.066 entries
38. Les Petites fleurs rouges of Yuan Zhang (China) : not any number of entries, movie released in the last week of December 2006.
All the numbers which illustrate this article come from the magazine Le Film Français N°3192-3193 of February 9, 2007
Now some adding informations to help you understand a little more about the box office result of April Snow in France.
As you’ve seen, among 38 Asian movies and 5 Korean movies released in France in 2006, April Snow is at 7th position in French box office, not bad for an art movie with unknown actors (here in France), released in a small number of movie theatres without lots of publicity.
Here are some comparisons between the number of entries and the number of theatres which show the movies when they were released.
- Wu Ji released in 206 theatres on 15/03/2006 with 33 in Paris : 184.216 entries
- The Host released in 223 theatres on 22/11/2006 with 30 in Paris : 154.407 entries
- April Snow released in 35 theatres on 12/04/2006 with 8 in Paris : 70.446 entries
- A bittersweet Life released in 45 theatres on 10/05/2006 with 10 in Paris : 30.772 entries
- Duelist released in 84 theatres on 17/05/2006 with 17 in Paris : 22.128 entries
Thanks to the website Allociné for the number of theatres.
posted by Toujours_BYJ @ 2/28/2007 07:05:00 PM
9 Comments:
Chere Camille:
Merci beaucoup pour votre article. Je n'ai aucune idee des activites qui se passent en 2006.
Il est curieux de voir que pas de film vietnamien ne se voit dans la liste. Il est vrai que les films vietnamiens n'ont pas encore produit beaucoup d'echo dans le monde!
Plutot des films documentaires. Nous pouvons alors toujours celebrer la bienvenue D'AS en France et etre fieres pour notre cher BYJ.
Merci et a bientot!
Chère anonyme
Comme l'a analysé Mr Dorel l'auteur de cet article, les distributeurs Français n'osent pas beaucoup acheter des films asiatiques, sauf si le metteur en scène ou l'acteur est bien connu par le public Français.
Et les films vietnamiens ne sont malheureusement pas encore bien connus ici.
Cependant, nous voyons de temps en temps des productions françaises dont le metteur en scène est d'origine Vietnamienne comme La Papaye Verte de Tran Anh Hung qui a gagné le caméra d'or à Cannes et qui a eu un joli succès en France il y a quelques années.
Chere Camille:
Merci et au fait j'ai oublie de signer Violet a la fin du message.
C'est moi, Violet et merci de nouveau pour votre notre sur La Papaya Verte. J'ai vu ce film.
AS est toujours cher a mon coeur, pour ses merveilleuses resonnances.
AS s Aussi quelque chose de tres europeen en style. La reserve dans l'expression, la profondeur des sentiments, c'est tres Francais selon moi et ca me rappelle un vieux film "La Princesse de Cleves" avec Jean Marais et Marina Vladi!
Hors du sujet! pardon!
Violet
Ma chère Violet
Je m'étais doutée que c'était vous mais je n'en étais pas très sûre.
Je suis tout à fait d'accord avec vous, le style d'AS est très français, c'est mon film préféré de tous les temps.
En ce qui concerne La princesse de Clèves, c'est un très vieux film, je ne me souviens pas si je l'ai vu ou non.
Bon week-end.
Thanks very much for your translation work. Good information. April Snow is a very good quality movie. Comparing Wu Ji, I would rather watch April Snow 5 times and Wu Ji, I made an attempt to watch once, but could not finish, I would rather watch it -1 time.
Meci.
Dear Heippieh
Thanks for your nice words. Like you, I couldn't finish Wu Ji, btw this movie had very very bad reviews in France, and didn't work well although a big campaign of publicity and the famous director.
I guess French have better taste than some other fellows.
Super intéressant, chère Camille. Merci de continuer cette chronique remarquable au sujet d'AS en France.
Gosijo, je suis très fière du résultat d'AS en France, surtout quand je compare le sien avec ceux des superproductions comme Wu Ji et The Host.
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