Amazon Japan doubles content budgets after JPY100 billion box office haul

Amazon MGM Studios Japan will double its investment in local content, a move designed to align the studio's output with global quality benchmarks. Studio head Buddy Marini disclosed the plan on Wednesday during a market session at the Tokyo International Film Festival. The gathering focused on unlocking the global potential of Japanese intellectual property.

The session was organized by the Motion Picture Association and UniJapan. It featured Marini alongside Matsuhashi Shinzo, CEO of Credeus, and Steven Maeda, the executive producer of Netflix's live-action One Piece series. Entertainment sociologist Nakayama Atsuo moderated the discussion.

Marini, who assumed the Japan studio leadership role in March, oversees homegrown films, series, and anime. His background includes serving as managing director of Warner Bros. Discovery Japan and CEO of Hulu Japan. He also founded Mangamo, a platform that manages projects from initial concept through to final production. His current strategy prioritizes expansion into global markets across all genres to reach diverse viewers.

Marini noted that Amazon Prime members receive movies as part of their subscription, a structural advantage for the platform. While the primary objective is to satisfy local audiences, the global nature of the service means viewers often overlook the origin of a title. He summarized this audience behavior with the phrase, "If it's interesting, it's interesting."

Upcoming productions include The Apothecary Diaries, a live-action adaptation of a bestselling historical mystery franchise, and Bless, a live-action series based on a manga about an aspiring makeup artist. Marini cited The Silent Service, a series about a rogue Japanese submarine captain, as a past success on Prime Video. He described the results as remarkable but noted that sustaining such quality levels is difficult.

Marini identified reverse-engineering as the key to building globally resonant intellectual property. This process involves creative staff working closely with screenwriters on scripts. He emphasized that this approach is the most important factor in the studio's new strategy.

Matsuhashi, whose producing credits include last year's box office record holder Kokuho, provided data on the financial performance of the industry. Films he produced passed JPY100 billion, or $633 million, in cumulative box office this year. He has negotiated success fees on his projects for more than two decades, a practice that has gradually become established in the Japanese market.

Matsuhashi's breakthrough came with Kingdom, a manga-based series set in China's Warring States period. The franchise launched in 2019 and now consists of five features. He recalled that Sanford Panitch, then in charge of international production at Sony Pictures, approached him with a choice: fill a quota of three films or revolutionize Japanese movies. Panitch chose the latter and signed on to a three-film plan. Each of those films earned more than JPY5 billion, or $31.7 million.

Steven Maeda discussed the challenges of adapting popular properties for a global audience. His One Piece series topped charts in 46 countries during its opening week in 2023 and drew more than 140 million viewing hours in its first seven days. He is currently adapting the Eisner-winning graphic novel Monstress for Amazon Prime Video with Tiff Greshler and Hivemind Entertainment.

Maeda said Netflix initially wanted One Piece produced as cheaply as possible. The production team argued that a show fans would appreciate would also attract new viewers. He described this tension as the central battle for global intellectual property. "And if you succeed, you can have an international success. And if you fail, everyone hates you," Maeda said.