OT American copying - was Re: [Sca-cooks] American Iron Chef

[Philip & Susan Troy]

"Pixel, Queen of Cats" wrote:
>
> I usually try to sit on my hands for these type of statements, but this
> one I had to respond to.

Hui! You must learn self-control, sampai. I trashed my reply to that
statement after, oh, the fifth line or so. However, seeing as how I
wasn't the only one to raise my eyebrows over it...

> Japanese animators copied Disney, when anime was first starting out. Why
> do you think all the people in the early stuff have Bambi eyes?
>
> And if America always copies Japan, why is McDonald's so dang popular over
> there?
>
> Margaret, who knows people for whom anime is their livelihood

Surely there are a bazillion areas in which American culture (sic) and
our corporate structure have invaded Japan, just as there is a current
fad in America for Japanese animation and related products.
(F'rinstance, all of Misha's examples. Forgive me if I sound
patronizing, this is far from my intent; but Misha is a young man and
may have a different memory and understanding of both what was and what
is. Not a problem.) Alternately, these can all be viewed as
contributions (?) to a world culture.

Yes, it's true that Japanese animation was, for years, consistently
better than American animation. As an example of quality workmanship, it
is very much no longer the case. Anime actually began to become
prominent when American film and TV producers realized that Japanese
artists and animators would work for less money than their American
counterparts. I'm talking over forty years ago, when a film revolution
(such as it was) occurred for the production of a cheesy
American-financed monster movie about a big lizard. Much of it was done
with stop-motion photography in Japan only because people like Willis H.
O'Brien and his young apprentice, Ray Harryhausen, were far too
expensive for the number of camera-minutes in which Gojira is actually
visible. The film simply could not have been made in America, although
that certainly would have been the first choice of the original
producers, given the amount of money spent by American filmgoers versus
Japanese ones.

Other projects followed, and an entire anime tradition was begun, but it
was never really intended to be better animation. It was driven entirely
by financial concerns. I won't bother with a complete history of anime
(not that I could provide one anyway), other than to say that it reached
something of a high point at the same time that American animation was
at a low point (does anybody remember Disney in the mid-70's?).

Subsequently, though, various technical improvements (mostly
computer-related) allowed for American animation that eventually became
consistently _better_ than anything the anime industry could produce. At
least, the best of it was of higher quality than the best of anime. So
much so that now, anime has adopted a distinctive style that attempts to
capitalize on its deficiencies. There was a huge article in the New York
Times a month or so ago which concerned the particular facets of the
anime style, and how, according to its current practitioners, what used
to be considered production values are _supposed_ to be low. The
animation is _supposed_ to be jerky, and people are _supposed_ to stand
absolutely motionless while their huge open mouths flap between frames
with gaping maws and closed mouths, and nothing in between.

And it should be remembered that most of the allegedly copied animation
found in America today is simply dubbed Japanese animation (read the
credits), not an attempt to copy a Japanese style.

As for Iron Chef, I have no idea whether the concept of an American
version is a proper example of the phenomenon Misha refers to, but it
seems to me a bad idea. I think the fact that it is Japanese is actually
part of the fun. it's kind of like watching an American-made
martial-arts movie starring, I dunno, Lawrence Welk. It might be
screamingly funny _if_ you could actually stay awake through it.

Adamantius (hates all anime post-Gigantor, loves Asian movies, even the
cheesy ones)
--
Phil & Susan Troy

troy at asan.com

"It was so blatant that Roger threw at him.  Clemens gets away with
things that get other people thrown out of games.  As long as they
let him get away with it, it's going  to continue." -- Joe Torre, 9/98