There wasn't anything at the venue to take a photo of, and I got electronic tickets rather than paper ones, so... this will have to do.
MrFodder and I went to see Toyko Idols as part of the Melbourne International Film Festival.
In Japan, idols are young girls who sing and dance - think the spice girls, but with more cutesy stuff and less "I'm an independent woman" stuff. The biggest idol group is AKB48 who sang Sugar Rush for the movie Wreck-It-Ralph. Their fans can be quite hardcore, and the movie focused on some of the behind-the-scenes stuff of the life of idols and their fans.
The documentary mostly focuses on Rio Hiiragi, a 19-year-old idol. Rio started in a café band, performing in a small café, before breaking off into a solo act - doing live streams for fans, concerts, fan meet-ups and entering competitions. It might seem like she has an easy life, with her fan club "Rio Brothers" and people adoring her, but she actually works quite hard, practicing her dance moves and singing, as well as keeping track of all her fans and answering fan mail - some of which is quite personalised, so it's not like she just sends generic thank you letters. But she has to work hard, because as she says, idols have a limited shelf-life, and she can't do this forever. She aspires to transition to becoming a singer.
That's the nice, heartwarming part of it. It moves on to Koji, who seems to be one of Rio's biggest fans. We learn that he was dating a girl, and hoping to marry her someday. He began saving for the event when she leaves him, having met someone else. Not long afterwards, he begins his descent into idol culture and reveals that he went to 700 concerts in a year (unlike the concerts in Australia, these idol concerts can be quite short, so it's not hard to attend more than one in a day). He has spent his entire life savings on idol culture. In a quite sad note, he admits that he could have bought an apartment by now, but instead, he has Rio. He says he spends $2000 a month on his idol hobby.
His devotion to her is quite amazing, and he rallies her fan club. He co-ordinates the members and strategises on how best to support Rio when she enters competitions. He gets bouquets for her larger concerts, even going as far as to select the flowers used, and organises a cake for her 21st birthday.
As creepy as it sounds, there are quite a lot of rules surrounding interaction with idols. They are only allowed to touch them at "handshake" events, and even then it's only to shake their hands. Though some fans are quite reluctant to let go, and the handlers have to move them along when their allotted time is up (there are actually people whose job it is to time how long the fans have been with the idols). Handshakes seem fairly innocuous, but for guys who don't have any other female interaction other than this, the physical contact is probably really exciting.
The interview some of the other idol fans, a large majority of whom are middle-aged males (though we do see some female fans at some of the concerts). A few of them are at one of the shrines on New Year's Day. Rather than making a wish for their own prosperity or anything like that, they pray that their favourite AKB48 idol manages to make it to "tier 1" this year.
They show that for the group AKB48, there is a general election held every year, with fans submitting the votes. Of the 300 or so members, only the top 80 are going to become stars that year, so it is quite competitive. One of the fans says that the girl they're praying for is 17, so she's becoming quite old. My jaw dropped at this point - if 17 is old, how young do they start?!
That question is answered not long after, where they show a 14-year-old idol, who is singing and dancing like her older counterparts. That's not even the worst of it. Next up is the idol group Carina Amore which features 10-year-old idol, Amu, who is dressed as a cat. One of her fans says that, "The appeal is that they're under-developed. If they were any older, I probably wouldn't like them." He goes on to say that they're like friends, and when someone points out that it's quite a large age gap between friends, he shrugs and says that he's only 24. That's getting into pedo territory there.
They show Amu at one of her handshake events, and it's actually amazing how well she handles talking to the fans. Despite her young age, she's clearly cultivating her image, and she is really diplomatic with her responses, making the fans feel at ease and loved.
So then there's the dark, dark side to being an idol - purity. Idols are forbidden to have boyfriends, and despite the fact that they dress up as maids, schoolgirls, and all the typical fetish things, they're supposed to give off the impression that they're shy, innocent girls. That's so much easier to pull off if you're 10-years-old.
It's not all seedy on the fans' side though, the way the idols treat their fans, constantly saying things like, "I wouldn't be here if it weren't for you" and "Please stay with me forever" which feels a bit predatory to me, especially as they're preying on older single men. It reminded me of the main character in The Girlfriend Experience, whose job is to keep the men coming back and paying money. The documentary says that the idol industry is worth $1 billion.
One of the fans says that he used to have a girlfriend, but doesn't anymore now that he has an idol to worship. Another says that girlfriends are too much effort, and idols are much easier to be around. One of the "experts" interviewed says that idol culture is detrimental to Japan's future and should be banned.
Some of it is quite heartwarming. Rio wanted to promote herself, so she rode her bike around Japan doing concert performances to her fans that aren't from Tokyo. Koji and another one of her fans joined her, and they cycled around together, even though one of them had a bike that really wasn't suitable for long-distance riding. She seemed quite inspirational to other young girls.
The documentary didn't seem too heavily biased in either direction, and it was fascinating seeing how devoted some of the fans are, as well as the world that goes into being an idol. MrFodder and I both enjoyed it, though a part of me still feels a bit unsettled at the thought of 10- and 14-year-old idols.
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