The live-action version of "City Hunter", available on Netflix since April 25, 2024, ranked No. 1 worldwide in the weekly global Top 10 (non-English-language films) rankings (surveyed April 22-28).
”City Hunter” is a popular comic book (manga) series that was first published in 1985 by Tsukasa Hojo.
The live-action version has already been released in Hong Kong, South Korea, and France, and this will be the first live-action version in Japan.
The story is set in Shinjuku, Tokyo, where the main character, Akira Saeba, solves the problems of the underworld one after another with his clear mind and strong physical abilities.
The gun-action scenes are particularly spectacular.
The story is a perfect mix of serious and comedic parts, a style that keeps viewers on their toes.
”Mokkori" is one of the famous phrases for City Hunter fans, as the woman-loving Saeba Ryo often uses in the works.
*Mokkori is a Japanese onomatopeia for the sound of something that instantly grows and bulges against something. It is the sound of a boner, in other words.
As a Japanese and a fan of City Hunter, I am happy to see the high evaluation of the work, but I would like to think a little about it from the perspective of the domestic economy, away from the work itself.
Japanese film productions are mainly financed by a method called the production committee, in which funds are raised from investments from multiple companies to finance production.
The purpose of this method is to diversify the risk of a single company's investment in the event that a film does not become a hit, which would result in large liabilities.
This method is said to be unique to Japan.
Currently, as the domestic economy continues to stagnate, the number of audiences visiting movie theaters is decreasing, and movie theaters are closing year after year.
On the other hand, since Netflix has become the sole provider of film production funds, it has become an easier environment for domestic production companies to produce films.
As a result, it was possible to enhance the production effect compared to previous Japanese films, making it an attractive work of art.
Portrait Citation Meta: Netflix