Documentaries on Japanese Pop Culture: “Tokyo Idols”

Publisher: KimStim (USA)
Format: Region 1 DVD, NTSC, Japanese Dialogue with English Subtitles
Length: 92 minutes
Production Date: 2017
Currently in Print (as of writing): Yes

I was planning to do a new series on documentaries on Japanese pop culture, but realised I don’t quite have enough examples to make it ongoing. Instead of making it a regular feature, I have decided to cover them as I find them. First up is Kyoko Miyake’s recent doco on idol culture;

The bulk of this documentary, seemingly shot between 2014 and 2016, follows the then 19 year old Rio Hiiragi as she tries shooting towards her dream career of being a singer. In order to reach this goal, she has entered the world of independent, underground idols. Though she is quick to point out that she never wanted to be an idol, this part of her career is just to get her to her goal. Rio originally began her idol career as a member of an idol group in a themed café when she was 16. While she does have a manager of sorts, Rio is mostly a one woman show. She runs her own online shop selling various goods and CDs, has meet and greets after shows and does daily live streams to her fans. Over a relatively short period she has gained a small but very dedicated following.

We are then introduced to 43 year old Koji. Formerly a salary man, he discovered Rio and instantly became a fan. Fed up with the mediocrity of the salary man life, coupled with his fiancée leaving him and realising his life hadn’t turned out like he thought it would, astonishingly he quits his job and decides to help out promoting Rio via her passionate fan club the Rio Brothers. Koji is most certainly not your typical idol fan. He has spent most of his savings on idol related merchandise and went to 700 idol shows in a year. However as you’ll soon discover the only type of idol fan Miyake interviews is Koji’s type. As the film progresses, Rio’s career starts to gain traction; she does exceptionally well at an independent idol contest, lands a record deal with small label, a big time idol producer writes and produces a song for her, she has her first solo show, and goes on small nationwide promotional tour.

Miyake continues her odd focus on middle aged males in idol fandom, interviewing a guy who calls himself Mitacchi. In his late 50’s or older, Mitacchi discovered his idol obsession via a flyer handed to him by a waitress at his local pachinko parlour. The flyer was for a local idol themed café centred on indie underground idol group P.IDL. Going to the café, Mitacchi gets a crush on Yuka who is probably in her early 20’s. Amazingly Mitacchi dumps his girlfriend and begins to obsess on Yuka. He is constantly creating various bits of P.IDL and Yuka themed merchandise, some of which he gives her at the café. He later admits spending ¥200,000 a month on idol merchandise. The documentary shows him living in an old rundown apartment complex.

Two other young idols in small independent / underground idol acts are also briefly profiled. First is 14 year old Amu who is part of a group called Harajuku Story. Though bubbly and energetic, due to the large number of group members and the small stages they perform on, management practically forces her and other members to win the support of her fans who vote in a limited number of girls to perform. Again the focus here is on the fans. Miyake asks her if she feels weird that her fans are the same age as her father. Confused, Amu replies that her fans are of all ages, which bears out in the footage which does indeed show many of Harajuku Story’s fandom in their early 20’s or a little older. The final idol interviewed is 10 year old Yuzu who performs as part of the child group Amore Carina. Yet again Miyake implies to Yuzu’s mother that the fandom is made up of lecherous middle aged men, but she is just happy that her daughter enjoys what she is doing and is pleased she has gained some independence at such a young age (in regards to her traveling alone on public transport to get to shows).

In between these segments, Miyake interviews several people (I’m not going to call them experts on idols or pop culture, because they aren’t) in regards to idol culture. We are treated to some rather bizarre takes. Newspaper columnist Akio Nakamori attempts to make comparisons with modern day Japan to the depressed state of the United Kingdom's economy of the 1970’s, drawing links between the emergence of punk in the UK and the increased popularity of idol culture in Japan. While to a large degree hard core fans of idol culture are railing against society, this is a bit of a stretch. Another writer suggests the handshake events, popularised by idol group AKB48, are inherently sexual and that until recently handshaking was seen as sexual in Japan and oddly handshaking events inhabit a “legal grey zone” (I’m going to suggest that both statements are utter rubbish). One commentator flippantly suggests that idols should be banned because he has anecdotally heard collage aged men say they would rather follow idols instead of getting a girlfriend.

Unsurprisingly feminist author Minori Kitahara despises idol culture and suggests that “instead of connecting with women in their everyday life, the men choose girls they can dominate. Girls who are guaranteed not to challenge or hurt them. This society will stop at nothing to protect male fantasies and provide comfort for men”. I find this remark to quite off the mark in regards to most of the men interviewed for this film. But this is the preconceived notion Miyake pushes right from the beginning of the film. The doco starts with various pieces of footage of idol acts, mostly established ones that are on major labels. Over this footage is AKB48’s “Seijun Philosophy”, a slightly obscure B-side to their 2013 single “Heart Ereki”, with the lyrics “I want to protect my purity/Until I take off my school uniform”. Miyake's obsession with middle aged male fandom dominates much of the film. While in reality there is a sizable amount of fans who do fit this demographic, she constantly ignores the on camera presence of younger men in their early 20’s (who seem to make up the bulk of the audience) and surprisingly female fans, particularly the ones in Rio’s fanbase.

In a lot of ways I really despise these sorts of documentaries. In cases like this, the point is not to educate the audience, it’s to insert the filmmaker’s ideology or biases into the subject. I think it’s even worse when you’re dealing with a subject most westerners are completely unfamiliar with (despite the recent interest in the west of idol acts such as Kyary Pamyu Pamyu and Babymetal). Watching this documentary alone would lead people to believe that the idol phenomenon is a relatively recent one and is entirely comprised of female only groups and soloists with an entirely male fanbase. I completely understand that there is only a limited time within the documentary format to explore the long history of idol culture, but the film outright ignores it’s origins in the 1970’s with groups like The Candies and Pink Lady becoming superstars and the formation of modern idol fandom culture in the 1980's. Male idols marketed at an adoring female fanbase such as Johnny & Associates acts like Arashi, V6, SMAP and Hey! Say! JUMP, most of whom exploded in popularity in the mid 1990’s, are also conspicuously absent, considering how they dominate the media landscape. Miyake also ignores the burgeoning alt-idol scene which includes anti-idol acts like BiS (Brand-new idol Society), crossdresser Ladybeard’s death metal inspired Ladybaby and Deadlift Lolita groups and anonymous shoegaze inspired group ・・・・・・・・・ (pronounced “Dots”).

In promotional interviews for her film, Miyake feigns ignorance to idol culture as a whole, which seems really implausible considering how ingrained idols are in the Japanese media landscape and have been so since the 1970’s. While Miyake was born in Japan in 1976, she left to live and study in England around 2002. Now I know the popularity of idols waned in the 1990’s (but did explode in popularity again in the mid 1990’s with male idol groups such as SMAP), but there is no way in the world Miyake could have not known about them. One of the biggest groups in the 1980’s was Onyanko Club, whom would later inspire their producer and lyricist, Yasushi Akimoto, to create the infamous AKB48 in the mid 2000’s. AKB48 is ripe for criticism in this type of documentary, not just for the scandals surrounding them and the poor treatment of the women in the group, but also for the way fans are exploited in terms of acquiring tokens for handshake events and the like. However apart from the song at the opening of the film (which isn’t attributed to the group) the only criticism we see of the group is in terms of the Senbatsu Election process where fans select the group’s top eighty members for that year (the 45th Senbatsu Election in 2015 is depicted in the doco).

Miyake also tars everyone in the film with the same brush; Rio is lumped in with the other idol groups, P.IDL, Harajuku Story and Amore Carina which is absurd because Rio is a free agent while those other groups are run by mostly male management and the girls in those groups are paid employees. The fans also receive the same treatment; all are male, all don’t want girlfriends, all are fanatical about young women or girls. There’s little to no nuance, no real questioning why these men have poured all their free time and money into these groups. There’s also little time or effort to explain why these fans might reject Japanese society, especially salary man culture. Instead Miyake paints the fans as strange and possibly even paedophilic. In one telling subtitle translation, a fan of Amore Carina states that he likes the group because “Their selling point is that they’re not fully developed”, implying that he likes prepubescent girls over women. However in Japanese he actually says “kansei sarete inai”, most likely meaning the girls in the group are not as polished or as developed as professional performers. In fact this is one of the key reasons why fans like amateur groups, but obviously it did not fit Miyake’s preconceived ideas on idol fandom.

As I said before, these documentaries about subcultures, especially foreign subcultures, aren’t created to educate the public about them. They generally don’t exist to empathise with those who are involved in them or to explain their motives. They exist to suggest these subcultures are odd or even flat out immoral or repulsive. And because the general public and even western based fans of these subcultures in general aren’t all that familiar with daily Japanese life or pop culture in general, viewers of these types of documentaries can come to conclusion that Japanese society is odd and impenetrable for westerners. This is of course utter nonsense. Miyake doesn’t even take the time to explain why she has filmed some of the material. For example we see several shots passing by Akihabara Sixteen, a live venue for independent and underground idol acts where Rio performs. However this is never explained in the film.

Instead it’s lumped in with other random shots of Akihabara streets and other unconnected shots of Tokyo streetscapes. I also believe much of Rio’s story is presented out of sequence on purpose for dramatic effect. For example the film ends with Rio recording a single with a famous producer; however I believe this took place well before her 21st birthday concert. Much like Vice’s “Schoolgirls for Sale in Japan”, this doco takes a pop culture oddity from Japan (in that case idol group Kamen Joshi and their fans) and presents it as sinister and commonplace. Sure “Tokyo Idols” is hardly as sensationalistic nor does it cover the sex industry, but in many ways it feels similar. Much of the controversy and issues surrounding AKB48 are downplayed or ignored in favour of criticism of lower rung idol groups and their fans. It’s odd because you’d think Miyake would want to celebrate Rio’s independence and success against the odds. Idol culture deserves to be criticised and explored in much more nuanced and thorough detail. “Tokyo Idols” fails to do that on every level.

Anime On the Big Screen: “Love Live! Sunshine!! The School Idol Movie: Over the Rainbow”

Venue: Dendy Cinemas, Level 2, North Quarter, Canberra Centre, 148 Bunda Street, Canberra City, ACT
Date: Thursday 21 March 2019
Distributor: Madman Entertainment
Format: Digital Projection, Japanese dialogue with some Italian dialogue and English subtitles
Length: 100 minutes
Production Date: 2019
Currently on Home Video in English (as of writing): No

So far 2019 has been a pretty good year for anime in cinemas. Not only have several films been released by Madman, a new film distributor, Half Symbolic, distributed the two recent Science Saru films, “Lu Over the Wall” and “The Night Is Short, Walk On Girl”, to cinemas in a limited screening format. But while there may be more anime in cinemas, there seems to be a lot less patrons. Looking back though my previous reviews of theatrical anime films, there used to be around 20 to 30 people attending these films around two or three years ago. Last year it averaged 15 people per film. Today’s screening had seven people.

The lack of patrons is also reflected in the amount of screenings Dendy has for this film; one per day at the rather inconvenient time of 6:30pm. Last year Dendy scheduled anime films twice a day and in years prior three to four times a day. This trend does not bode well for theatrical anime in this town. It was an absolute pain trying to get into the city and get a parking spot. The weather was rather warm for late March, heading towards the late 20’s. It was meant to rain Thursday but held off and must have only poured down briefly when I was in the screening. I decided to get dinner before the screening (Nandos, which I rarely have) and later had difficulty getting out of the Canberra Centre as sections were blocked off sometime before I got out of the screening, but not at places which would be logical, so you’d find yourself blocked from the exit you were going to, then have to backtrack a couple hundred meters to go back to an alternate exit! Anyway, let’s talk about the film;

Taking place soon after the final episode of the TV series (see here for a rundown of the series if you’re not familiar with the franchise), the second year students, Mari Ohara, Dia Kurosawa and Kanan Matsuura, set off on a post-graduation trip. The remaining six members of Aqours (pronounced Aqua) have decided to continue on as a group. As Uranohoshi Girls' High School has been formerly closed, they decide to take a trip out to see the new school they'll be attending next term, which is on the other side of the city. When they finally reach their destination, they are horrified to discover it is a mothballed and very run down primary school. They go to a restaurant to eat away their sorrows when they discover You Watanabe has left them and is outside talking to a boy her age. Believing that You has a boyfriend, the five of them follow her. But it is soon revealed that the “boy” is actually her female cousin, Tsuki Watanabe, who has come to visit her.

Tsuki is from the high school that the remaining six members of Aqours will attend. She explains that the students from Uranohoshi Girls' High School are being forced to spend their remaining school life at the old primary school that was shut down several years ago. Both the board of their new school and the parents believe that because their school has several clubs which compete and win at a national level, the clubs from Uranohoshi Girls' High School would feel out of place. However Aqours have just won Love Live!, and the girls are determined to show the new school that they can compete like the other school clubs. But their performance at their new school doesn’t go well and the board and the parents association won’t budge on letting the Uranohoshi Girls' High School students study on the main campus grounds.

Despite this set back, the remaining six members of continue their training as part of being in the School Idol club. While training on the beach, they receive a visit from Saint Snow. Discussing their performance with them, Saint Snow asks them to perform to see where they went wrong. Sarah of Saint Snow says that because of the loss of the other three members, they seem to have forgotten who they are as a group. Her sister, the other half of Saint Snow, Leah, is quite angry at Aqours, tells them that Love Live! isn't a game and runs off. Sarah later explains that due to Saint Snow disbanding after their devastating loss at Love Live!, Leah has been trying to create a new idol group, however the new group isn’t working very well as a unit, mainly because Leah expects a very high standard from her fellow members. Suddenly a helicopter flies in quickly from the ocean and Mari Ohara’s mother hops out.

Mrs Ohara asks the remaining members of Aqours to search for Mari, Dia and Kanan who are apparently missing. She tells them she will offer a reward if they are found and flies them off Italy where the trio were last seen. The girls arrive in Venice where Tsuki offers her services as a guide as she lived there during her childhood. While Ruby is terrified at the Venetian masks and other paraphernalia on display in shop windows, the others easily manage to find the missing girls who are atop the Palazzo Contarini del Bovolo. There they have a joyful and somewhat tearful reunion, especially Ruby who is overjoyed to see her sister Dia again. For some reason there are posters all around Venice claiming Mari, Dia and Kanan are missing. Mari realises Aqours have been tricked by her mother into finding her. She quickly slips the girls a card which has a clue as to where they are living in Italy, as she along with Dia and Kanan make their escape.

Aqours follow the clues to Florence which eventually leads them to the mansion that the trio are staying at. Despite Mari taking extra steps to avoid her mother by staying at her friend’s family mansion instead her own family’s, her mother eventually tracks her down. Mrs Ohara is frustrated with Mari’s rebellious streak and thinks her time as a school idol was waste of time. She plans to punish Mari (trying not to give away spoilers here!), but Aqours makes a deal with her; if they can show that being a school idol can touch people’s hearts, she has to leave Mari alone. Aqours embark on creating a new performance on the Spanish Steps in Rome in order to win Mrs Ohara over.

This is the second “Love Live!” film in the franchise. Much like the first film, it follows a similar formula; the initial opening scenes concentrate on childhood versions of several characters. We are then transported to the present where the group has “broken up”, a couple of musical sequences follow, then the cast are sent to a foreign country for an adventure, return to complete some sort of task with several more musical numbers, then a grand finale with a huge musical number to send the characters off. However the story of “Love Live! Sunshine!!” is no clone of its predecessor. Sure, in the series there are nine girls who are archetypes of the original nine girls in in µ's, but unlike that group they aren’t overnight success stories. They miserably fail Love Live! the first time around. Their school is shut down despite their best efforts. And unlike µ's and A-RISE's really friendly rivalry in the original series and movie, Aqours' rival, Saint Snow, is initially their nemesis.

I think as a result, “Love Live! Sunshine!!” feels more realistic than its predecessor, or at least more believable. Sure a lot of it is rather silly, especially the plot involving Mari’s mother and whole Italian trip. The idea that Aqours members, Riko Sakurauchi and Chika Takami, could write and produce dozens of great pop tunes for the group seems somewhat implausible. As do the fantastically choreographed set pieces, though they seem more plausible than the almost high fantasy ones that appear in the original series and movie of this franchise. There’s also the cruelness of their new school practically quarantining the students from Uranohoshi Girls' High School away in some run down primary school as if they were diseased or something. And because Aqours actually won Love Live!, a highly popular school idol contest, it seems really implausible that their new school would be unaware of this and wouldn’t open their arms to them and the group in order to be seen in a positive light from the community and to bring in potential students.

But putting aside those niggling problems I have with the film and series overall, while this film uses the original movie as template, it does add a fair wack of originally, and most importantly fun. As I said previously, this film feels far more realistic and far less forced than the original. For example in “Love Live! The School Idol Movie”, the plot for µ's going to New York was pretty thin and didn’t really make a lot of sense. Here the reasons why the girls have to go to Italy are silly, but a heck of a lot more plausible. The reason behind Aqours preforming at the end of the film is also clear; they want to show the new school board and parents, they are worthy of becoming part of their school community. However that plot line at times does get lost amongst some other plot threads. One of those being the best part of the film in my opinion; the focus on Leah and Saint Snow. Early parts of the film show Leah trying to grapple with everything the wake of Saint Snow’s dissolution which is underpinned by her regret of performing badly at the Love Live! finals. This is resolved in fantastic sequence where Leah is able to get a “do over” in terms of Saint Snow’s final performance. For me it’s easily the highlight of the movie.

However the other five performances from Aqours members during the film aren’t bad either. Sure, they may not have the over the top gloss µ's performances did in the original film, but the musical sequences are really fun and engaging. Except for two of those performances, all are “real performances” in the context of the film (i.e. a planned performance for an audience on a stage). There isn’t a great deal of out of the blue song and dance musical type numbers which were common in the first movie. Like that film there is a total of seven songs performed. However one of those is not a choreographed performance but set to a montage of the girls preparing a stage for the opening of their new school. The seventh song is the previously mentioned Saint Snow performance. As per the rest of the franchise, as you'd expect, there isn’t much character development in this film. The cast reprise their character traits and catchphrases, mostly for comedic purposes. Yoshiko Tsushima’s alternate Yohane personality unsurprisingly does get a lot screen time, but not to the detriment of the other girl’s.

New characters such as You’s cousin Tsuki Watanabe and Mari’s mother are given slightly modified versions of their blood relations. I suppose this is to be expected in this franchise. Generally the selling point of this show (besides the music and dance numbers) are the characters, their personalities and wringing as many comedic moments as you can out of those characters. I don’t think this is a bad thing at all. As I said previously, the song and dance routines aren’t as flashy at the first film, but they are pretty good none the less. I still have issues with the CG versions of the girls in these sequences, but they have improved greatly since the original TV series. However some of the crowd CG sequences, especially those in an early sequence outside the train station, surprisingly look bad. But overall the animation is pretty damn good. Like the first film, “Love Live! Sunshine!! The School Idol Movie: Over the Rainbow” is a fantastic love letter to fans of the franchise. I would also argue it also gives Aqours a far better send off than µ's got in their film. Finally just to note, there is a post credits sequence, but it appears after the copyright notice and Eirin mark, which is highly unusual for a Japanese film. 7.5 out of 10.