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Shiori Ito, a journalist who made the documentary \u201cBlack Box Diaries,\u201d about sexual assault and her experience with Japan\u2019s justice system, in Fukuoka, Japan, Oct. 6, 2024. The film about her search for justice after she reported being raped, the first full-length documentary by a Japanese director ever nominated for an Oscar, cannot be seen in her home country. [Shiho Fukada\/The New York Times]<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n
TOKYO \u2014 A film by a Japanese woman about her search for justice from uncooperative authorities after she reported being raped is a contender at Sunday\u2019s Academy Awards. Yet, despite being the first full-length documentary made by a Japanese director ever nominated for an Oscar, the movie cannot be seen in her home country.<\/p>\n
In the film, \u201cBlack Box Diaries,\u201d journalist Shiori Ito tells the story of what happened to her after she reported being raped at a hotel by a prominent television journalist and the ordeal she says she experienced with Japan\u2019s justice system.<\/p>\n
The film, which is up for best documentary feature, premiered in January 2024 at the Sundance Film Festival. It was released in US theaters in October and can currently be seen or is slated to be shown in over 30 countries. However, those do not include Japan.<\/p>\n
The Japanese subsidiary of a major streaming service declined to distribute the film in early 2024, the filmmakers said, and theaters have so far displayed little interest in showing it. The prospects for the film\u2019s release grew even murkier in October when Ito\u2019s former lawyers and other previous supporters, including fellow journalists, spoke up against her, saying she had used footage without the consent of people in it.<\/p>\n
This is not the first time that Japan has balked at showing unflattering films that were well received in Hollywood. \u201cThe Cove,\u201d a documentary about a dolphin hunt in the town of Taiji, and \u201cUnbroken,\u201d a feature film about cruel treatment of Allied prisoners during World War II, both opened at least a year after their US premieres. \u201cThe Cove,\u201d which was made by an American director, won the Oscar for best documentary feature in 2010.<\/p>\n
Ito said that \u201cBlack Box Diaries\u201d is running into resistance, despite having a Japanese director, because it shines a light on a topic normally kept in the shadows: how the legal system and society, more broadly, look unfavorably on women who come forward to say they were sexually assaulted.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis film is not just about sexual violence. It\u2019s about power, corruption and systemic problems,\u201d Ito said. \u201cI am making many people uncomfortable, that\u2019s for sure.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ito, 35, has been a polarizing figure since she came forward in 2017 to say that she was raped while unconscious by journalist Noriyuki Yamaguchi after an evening of drinking over dinner. Yamaguchi, who was the biographer of former Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, denied the charges, and a criminal case was dropped by prosecutors after two months.<\/p>\n
Ito won a lawsuit against him for damages in a ruling that was upheld by Japan\u2019s Supreme Court.<\/p>\n
The case made her a symbol of Japan\u2019s still underdeveloped #MeToo movement, while critics have accused her of grandstanding to advance her career.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere is a tendency in Japanese society to avoid talking about hot-button issues,\u201d said Atsushi Funahashi, a film director. \u201cI believe this film should become a catalyst to ensure that no woman ever has to go through this kind of painful experience again.\u201d<\/p>\n
The stress of all the attention appeared to take its toll on Ito. On Feb. 20, she canceled a Tokyo news conference at the last minute, citing medical reasons. A limited screening of an edited version of her film was also scrapped.<\/p>\n
A group of lawyers, including those who had represented her in the lawsuit, held their own news conference the same day to reiterate their concerns with the film. They said \u201cBlack Box Diaries\u201d uses video and audio of a taxi driver, a police detective and one of the lawyers without those individuals\u2019 permission.<\/p>\n
They also faulted Ito for including footage of herself being dragged out of a taxi by Yamaguchi when they arrived at the hotel. The footage from a security camera was used without the hotel\u2019s permission, said the lawyers, who demanded that it and other scenes be deleted or greatly altered.<\/p>\n
\u201cI must now speak out against someone whom I fought alongside for so many years,\u201d one of the lawyers, Yoko Nishihiro, said. \u201cHow miserable is this.\u201d<\/p>\n
In a statement released after canceling her news conference, Ito apologized for \u201ccausing harm\u201d by not obtaining consent and said she is making a modified version of the film \u201cto ensure that individuals cannot be identified.\u201d<\/p>\n
At the same time, there are scenes that Ito and the film\u2019s producers say they are unwilling to cut. One of these is the security camera footage from the hotel, which Ito said was \u201cthe only visual proof of the sexual assault.\u201d<\/p>\n
Eric Nyari, a producer of the film, said they were trying to negotiate a version of the film that could address the criticisms regarding privacy while still exposing what happened.<\/p>\n
\u201cThere are certain areas where we are meeting concerns,\u201d Nyari said, \u201cbut there are certain areas where we believe we\u2019re in the right, and we are not going to change.\u201d<\/p>\n
This article originally appeared in The New York Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n