KORTH SHOR

SHOHEL MAMURA FILM RETROSPECTIVE AT THE
PACIFIC CINEMATHEQUE ON NOW UNTIL APRIL 6

Master ci

OR much of the

twentieth century
Japan’s film industry
rivaled Hollywood’s as a
major centre of film

production.

The Japanese studio system CX
had its own roster of directors we
and stars pumping out motion
pictures for the masses.

Domestic mass consumption, that is.

While some carly directors such as Teinosuke Kinugasa
took their work on brief international tours most of the
world remain ily unaware of Japanese cinema until
the 1950s. By that time some of the greatest directors had
been making films for more than thirty years and were near
the end of their careers.

“At the peak of the Japanese studio system they were pro-
ducing 800 to 1,000 feature-length films per year,” Audic
Bock, author of Japanese Film Directors (1978), told th
News in a telephone conversation from Berkeley, California.
“Bur the system began to fall apart in the 1970s. Now there
are only about 15 (quality feature-length films) made per
year and of those we are lucky if a couple get international
distribution... are No guarantees on anything coming
out of Japan these days - not even Godzilla.”

For the next month, Vancouver audiences will get the
opportunity to view classic Japanese films rarely shown in
North America as the Pacific Cinematheque screens a major
retrospective called The Films of Maverick and Master Shohei

‘John. Goodman

Sce bnamura page 28

Nikkatsu

ura’s third film from 1958 Endless Desire.

ERTAINMENT GUIDE

ALITA SAHEBJ

NEWS photo Paul McGrath

AZITA Sahebjam, founder of the Vancouver Pars National
Ballet, is joined by some of the younger dancers of the group.

tT

HE Vancouver Pars National
Ballet is a cultural lifeboat, burst-
ing with life and color.

The dance group has its roots in Iran. The
Pars National Ballet was founded in 1966 by
Abdohla Nazemi in Tebrar

The director had started his dancing career in
1954 with the newly launched franian National
Academy of Baller. emi's choreographic
work inchided classical and modern ballet.
innovator he led the group to integrate the classical art form with the many
dance traditions of the country.

The Pars National Baller performed mostly tor television audiences in
Iran. Nazemi was a producer and director with National [ranian Radio and
Television. The group also offered instruction to children through schools.

The dancers remained active in Tran until L982. Te became impossible to
continue much after the revolution. The conservative religious leaders who
had replaced the deposed shah had a hard time with the notion of women
dancing in public. Repression followed.

One such dancer, Azita Sahebjam had joined the ballet while in clemen-
tary school in 1975. By 1977 she had become one of the group's dance
instructors, Following the revolution, Sahebjam eventually moved to North

Bs Mich#'el Becker

See Baller pane 24

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