The objectives of the First Old Town Taito International Comedy Film Festival, which runs Nov. 21 to 24 in the Tokyo districts of Asakusa and Ueno, sound ambitious. Noting on the festival's English-language Web site that "there are innumerable film festivals held throughout the world," the executive committee says that theirs means to be "a bridge between comedy-film fans in Japan and other areas of the world."
Nothing denoting "international" is included in the festival's Japanese name — Dai-ikkai Shitamachi Comedy Eigasai in Taito — and of the 23 films being screened, 11 are Japanese, 11 are American, and one is British, so the "bridge" appears to go mainly to Hollywood. Moreover, "comedy-film fans" who don't understand Japanese need to be warned before they rush out for tickets — since it isn't clear on the Web site — that the Japanese films will not have subtitles and all the seminars and discussions except one will be in Japanese with no English interpreting. Even the one British movie, "Wallace and Gromit in The Curse of the Were-Rabbit" (2005), will be presented in its Japanese dubbed version.
So calling the festival "international" is a bit of a stretch, which isn't to say the enterprise is a total misrepresentation of what it wants to accomplish. The important word is "Shitamachi," which the committee translates as "old town" and which describes the region of Tokyo centered on Asakusa and Ueno where the common folk of Tokyo lived, worked and — most significantly — played during the century leading up to the economic miracle of the 1960s and the rise of the Japanese middle class. Whatever your notion of "Japanese comedy" is, it was born and evolved in the Rokku entertainment district of Asakusa, because that is where the hoi polloi went to enjoy themselves without having to worry about anyone of higher station ruining their fun.