I got it bad for the new girl in school

MY TOTALLY GLAM INTERVIEW WITH

Kenji Kamiyama
Director of Ghost in the Shell: Stand Alone Complex and Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. 2nd Gig. Screenwriter of Blood: The Last Vampire.

Mitsuhisa Ishikawa
Founder and president of Production I.G. Also producer of the Ghost in the Shell films, Blood: the Last Vampire, Jin-Roh, the animated sequence for Kill Bill Vol. 1, and many other titles.

How do you think the domestic market has changed for Anime in the last few years?

Mitsuhisa Ishikawa:
There are just too many shows and too many productions going on right now. And the amount of staff available doesn’t match the demand. There are more shows than staff. That’s the bad part about the industry. On the other hand, the good part is that within that environment, the younger staff, or the people who are just starting to enter the industry, have more opportunities to get involved with shows and have good experiences.

And how about the international market?

Mitsuhisa Ishikawa:
It’s very clear that in the US now that there are shows that are well accepted and more liked than other ones. And at the same time there are others that are not so well accepted. But from a production standpoint, the reason why Japanese animation has become so popular in America is not only because of the quality of the animation, but because of the skill of the directors and also the way the characters express themselves. So naturally, many people are attracted to it.

So how does Production I.G. fit into this scene?

Mitsuhisa Ishikawa:
Our policy is that I think it’s dangerous to go in the same direction as everyone else. Just because anime is becoming popular in America, it’s not always a good idea to try and make an anime for the US market. At the same time, 3D CGI animation is popular, you know…Dreamworks is making it, Pixar is making it…but then it’s not our thing to make full 3D animation. What we do is make the kinds of things we ourselves would like to see. I think that’s why our animation is very unique and special.

The works from Production I.G. are very diverse in tone and theme. Are there any common points that you think connects them in any way?

Mitsuhisa Ishikawa:
I believe that the common point between our works is that they’re all very cool. And the reason why they are cool is because nobody can copy or imitate them. The reason we can make shows and films like we do is because all our shows are director based. In a live action movie, they’re often star-based projects. But in an animation project, its all because of what the director does. I trust all my directors 100% and give them the freedom to make what they want. That’s probably why, from a production standpoint, our works are cool.

So how is Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. 2nd GIG compare to the first series in terms of story?

Kenji Kamiyama:
Basically, 2nd GIG is a sequel to the first series. But this time, the conflict is much larger. The size of the crimes are bigger than in the first season. 2nd GIG deals with crimes of the 21st century like terrorism and war and the characters must encounter greater threats. It’s more of a serious theme than in the first series.

How is your vision of Ghost in the Shell different from Mamoru Oshii?

Kenji Kamiyama:
Actually, I tried to stay very close to the world of Ghost in the Shell that Mamoru Oshii has already established. I wanted to make a copy, or a duplicate, of his movie. But because Oshii is 15 years older than me we eat different food, we wear different clothes. We live different lives. Even if I had tried to make a clone or copy of this original movie, there will be differences because the difference is in our lifestyle. I think it was good that instead of trying to make something radically different, we ended up with a work that was different naturally.

Production I.G. works are often minded by critics and viewers for their political content or “meaning.” Do you yourselves see them are political work with a message, or entertainment?

Kenji Kamiyama:
I don’t think we meant to make Blood: The Last Vampire as a political film so much as we wanted to make a story set in a realistic world. So naturally it wound up becoming a political film. But it wasn’t our intention to make something explicitly political.

Mitsuhisa Ishikawa:
When I see interviews with director Oshii, there are often questions about politics. All his answer to those types of questions is“ no comment.” And there’s a reason for that. He doesn’t think that his films are made simply because of politics. He may be interested in them, but that’s not why he made the movie. But if he just talks on and on about the meaning of his films, he’s just going to become like one of the critics himself.

Kamiyama,  how would you compare art direction to directing animation?

Kenji Kamiyama:
When working as a director, you need to be able to manage all the creative staff. Whereas when you’re working as an art director, you just concentrate on what you’re drawing. But as a director, you have to supervise the entire production. So it’s no longer technical work. Also, a difficult thing you have to do, as a director, is make many decisions on things. When you’re an art director, and you run into a problem, you just let other people take care of it. But you’re the director, you’re constantly being asked for your input.

So what goals or plans does I.G. have for the future?

Mitsuhisa Ishikawa:
We definitely accomplished a big project by making Ghost in the Shell 2: Innocence. It was such a big accomplishment that in order to make our next big film, we need to sort of reboot everything and start from zero. We can’t be inactive, so we have to keep making films. But then we need money to begin new projects.

Is there a message for viewers about to watch 2nd GIG?

Kenji Kamiyama:
Ghost in the Shell: S.A.C. 2nd GIG  is more complicated than the first one, so don’t be left behind. Keep up with the series. Also, another thing you can expect is a romance planned for major Kusanagi.

Comments

[Daniel Zelter]

Man, I'd never have the balls to say address a Japanese animator with a casual phrase like "samma sensei whatever". Hope he took it ok.

[Daniel Zelter]

Oh, and Carl, you're in this week's Entertainment Weekly for Steamboy.

[Carl Horn]

"I don’t we meant to make Blood: The Last Vampire as a political film so much as we wanted to make a story set in a realistic world. So naturally it wound up becoming a political film. But it wasn’t our intention to make something explicitly political."

Well, there are a lot of times and places to choose from in the realistic world; but more at less at random, apparently, BLOOD just happens to be set on Yokota AB right in the middle of its role as an active strike base in Operation Rolling Thunder. Kamiyama reminds me of Roger DeBris from THE PRODUCERS: "I never knew the Third Reich meant Germany...I mean this play is drenched with historical goodies like that!"

From "Penumbra: The Uncertain View of BLOOD THE LAST VAMPIRE":

...In an August 2001 interview with the online magazine Akadot, Kamiyama said of BLOOD, “we weren't really thinking about making any kind of political statement,” but had prefaced that assertion by saying, “The reason we set it on a U.S. base is that Japan is an island country, so it doesn't have any borders really. The 'fence' around Japan that the U.S. military bases have created is in fact the only real borderline that has been drawn around us. These borders create a certain kind of tension.” Kamiyama did not even mention the time in which BLOOD is set, only its space; yet it is difficult to see how the premise as he himself states it could be viewed as apolitical, now or then....

...Ruh writes of BLOOD’s conclusion, “The only time there is brilliant sunlight is at the very end, after the events of the story have been resolved. This light is an illusion, however, because in the midst of such a thankful reprise, a giant bomber takes off from the airbase, on its way to sow further seeds of destruction in Vietnam. Daylight is the realm of the human world, yet the war symbolized by the airbase is just as terrible as the conflict between Saya and her prey. The parallel between the horrors of the previous evening and the dispatch of the bomber indicates that which is most frightening does not happen only at night.”

But, of course, the film and the ending of the film are far out of parallel. It is not the case that the war symbolized by the airbase was just as terrible as the conflict between Saya and her prey. The conflict was not terrible; the conflict did not even exist. In reality, there was no Saya, and there were no vampires; only the base, and the bombers, and the millions of war dead existed. There is no penumbra without a broad light; its existence, like all fiction, comes from the only source of illumination—reality. But has a room become real when you turn on the light? It was always there; Yokota was there, the planes were there, seen throughout the film taking off, their business indifferent to the pitful scraps of a dying race. It is the anime’s ending that raises the level of the whole; but only in that it shows the whole.

In a story published in the haze-time of BLOOD, Harlan Ellison imagined a future where we could for our entertainment conjure a show of the gory killings of another gothic creature, Jack the Ripper. Commenting upon 1967’s “The Prowler in the City at the Edge of the World,” Ellison says the monster he seeks to portray is “the Jack that tells us to stand and watch…the Jack that condones Vietnam because we don't care to get involved, the Jack that we need. We are a culture that needs its monsters…That is the message of the story. You are the monsters.”

NAW. Y'all are trippin'--I didn't REALLY just quote DANGEROUS VISIONS. Shit...too late.

[Aaron B.]

Hmmm... I've always felt that the Major was neither just dangerous or just sexy, but dangerously sexy.

In any case, great interview. I've always enjoyed the works of Production IG because I know that Ishikawa and his staff always have a clear and distinct perception of where the industry is going, and with what they want to do with their projects.