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Former Kinema Jumpo Editor Explains 'your name.'s' Lack of Rank on Best Film List

Last Tuesday, film magazine Kinema Jumpo revealed its list of the 10 best Japanese films of 2016. Sunao Katabuchi's film In This Corner of the World ranked at #1. That is a remarkable achievement for the anime based on Fumiyo Kōno's To All The Corners Of The World (Kono Sekai no Katasumi ni) manga. However, many fans were surprised that Makoto Shinkai's smash-hit film your name. (Kimi no Na wa.) did not rank on this list.

Former Kinema Jumpo editor-in-chief Yūko Sekiguchi offered an explanation for the rankings:

The critic-chosen Best Ten list does not necessarily match box-office records. The critics also see films that audiences can't discover, and in other words, get a dull reception at the box office. Because of that, when some people propose those films to rank highly with their received points, it means that the the films that rank on the list may be those unfamiliar to the general public. There are two types of works that rank on the lists. One case is when there are a few people who choose a film as #1 (10 points). In contrast, there is also a case where a comparatively large number of people support the film low on the list (one or two points). Doesn't it seem like your name. is the latter? Therefore, although many people valued it, the score probably didn't reflect that. However, because the films that everyone is seeing with high box-office revenues are often chosen highly on the readers' Best Ten, which will be published in the Kinema Jumpo that goes on sale on February 3, I think there is a high possibility that [your name.] will rank [on that list].

Film critics, newspaper reporters, and film magazine editors make up the committee that chooses Kinema Jumpo's annual lists of the ten best Japanese, foreign, and "culture" films. Each committee member votes for 10 films for each list. The films each receive from one to ten points, depending on where they fall on each voter's list. The total points received for each film determines the final ranking.

A special issue of the magazine will reveal in the beginning of February the films that each committee member voted for and the reasoning for their votes.

In recent years, it has become fairly common for box-office hit films in Japan to not rank on the magazine's lists. The popular 2014 film Frozen and 2013 film Eien no Zero ranked #70 and #26 on the magazine's lists in their respective years. On the other hand, character-driven films with relatively smaller screening distributions have ranked #1 on the Japanese list in the previous five years.

The magazine launched in 1919, and it began publishing the Best Ten lists in 1924. Before In This Corner of the World, the magazine had not awarded the #1 spot to an animated film since Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli's My Neighbor Totoro in 1988. The magazine also awarded Katabuchi with the Best Director Award for 2016.

Hideaki Anno and Shinji Higuchi's Shin Godzilla ranked #2 on the 2016 list. The magazine awarded Anno with the Best Scriptwriter award.

Source: @nifty News (Masakazu Isobe) via Yaraon!