日本映画監督協会

Certain to be long remembered in the hallowed history of Japanese film, an "unprecedented" as well as "unpardonable" work has made its appearance. It could even be called a world first: a feature film enacted by film directors, Eiga Kantoku-tte Nan Da! (What the Heck is a Film Director!). Made with reckless abandon by some 200 of the 580 members of the Directors Guild of Japan - one might say, too many cooks trying to brew up a storm - the film employs the full range of genres from period film to documentary to ask anew, "What is the essence of a film director's work?" Featuring the performance of one of Japan's leading actresses, Koizumi Kyoko, and an appearance by the world-renowned director Oshima Nagisa, the film has caused a raucous debate between those who call it a "masterpiece" and those who consider it the "world's greatest failure."

Participants were heard to declare, "No one volunteered to be in this film," and "I don't want anyone I know to see this film," but the directors who stand on the front lines of Japanese film threw themselves into the project, which casts a back light and a critical eye on film itself. The ultimate in auteur filmmaking, it is a one-of-a-kind issue film.

Check out this "shameless pandemonium" for yourself.

The film, "Eiga Kantoku-tte Nan Da!," written and directed by Ito Shunya, is aimed at garnering attention for the Directors Guild of Japan's assertion that "copyright in films belongs to the director."

That may seem self-evident, but in fact Japanese copyright law assigns copyright in films to the film companies that provide the funding for films, and directors have no copyright. There is a long history to why it has come to be so, and it is necessary to examine just when, where, by whom, and with what twisted reasoning this seemingly self-evident right was denied, bringing us to the current state of affairs.

This is what this film does, using the full range of film techniques - dramatic sketches, historical recreations, documentary footage, interviews - to explain the path this issue has followed. Even for someone like myself, who has looked into this issue as a specialist, there were many fascinating moments where I realized, "Oh, that person was saying that, at that time."

But it is not only that. It turns out that demonstrating that it is directors who make films, though seemingly self-evident, is not so easy. This is exactly what leaves room for production companies to unilaterally assert their rights. Where and how does the creativity of the film director come into play? It is the attempt to answer this question that makes this film interesting. Unless the director succeeds in doing this, making a film that stands on its own and vividly reflects the creativity of Ito Shunya, it is no more than a piece of propaganda for the Directors Guild of Japan, and in fact it will lack power as propaganda. This is the challenge that Ito confronted, and it is this that makes the film interesting and worth watching. It is the latter half of this film, particularly the tension-filled scene near the end, that makes it worth watching.

This film was also made to commemorate the 70th anniversary of the Directors Guild of Japan, and members of the guild appeared in the film en masse. They are not identified one by one, but for those who love Japanese film, it is nothing but a spectacle.

The film "Cut!" is a work of advocacy for the recovery of copyright to films, while it is also entertainment. Only after the film premiered in 2006 did I learn that others had pioneered down this road. In 1929, when 25 delegates gathered in Lausanne, Switzerland for the first Congress of Independent Cinema, Sergei M. Eisenstein and Hans Richter co-directed a short film that the delegates acted in and produced. It was a comic drama, staged at the La Sarraz castle where the conference was held, that depicted the resistance to the onslaught of commercial film, with Hollywood at the summit. Unfortunately this film, "The Storming of La Sarraz," has vanished into the mists of time. Now that the English-subtitled version of our film is finished and it can be seen overseas, I dream of the day that the film "Cut!" will be screened in that very place, Lausanne.