Discussion
June 14th 2022, the 267th Japan Specialist Seminar was held online. With 20 participants, Jeong, Choongsil who is an Assistant Professor from Department of Japanese Studies in Dong-Eui University made a lecture titled : “Japanese Film Archive and Prokino Archiving ”
Professor Jeong first introduced Prokino, an organization who produced and showed the movies about Proletarian ideas in 1929-1934. With the rising attention that the Japanese society gave to film archiving in the 1980, the presenter gave an overview of how Prokino films are restored and ran in 1980 as well.
Professor Jeong interpreted that the process was driven by “archive fever”. In 1980, people gave attention only to the Porkino memberships via the added subtitles, dissolution of materials and the description of Prokino history during the archiving. The Organization`s feature of resistance, which is thought to be the characteristic of the host / the producer (Prokino), is emphasized. Prokino films, which were made under various unfavorable conditions and hard to be understood. The existences of women and Zainichi, who actively interpreted the Porkino as resistance films in solidarity, were obscured and resulted in "memory weathering."
Q/A followed after the presentation. First, there was a question about the programming of prokino movies. In response, the presenter replied that because prokino films were short in length, several prokino films were screened at the same time.He added that the simultaneous screening also served as a factor that prevented the viewers` immersion to the movie.
In addition, the seminar was concluded after discussions on whether it was screened with Soviet films; the relationship between the change in the timing of the transition from silent films to meteor films; the exchange between the Japanese Prokino movement and Joseon; the power dynamics of mythicizing Prokino in the 1980s; the actual ideas and ideological spectrum of Prokino members; the techniques of Prokino films.
