“
The budget for culture in Japan is overwhelmingly small,” he explains. “
The Agency for Cultural Affairs uses around ¥2 billion ($18 million) for films.
Its counterpart in
Korea uses around ¥40 billion ($356 million), while in France the Centre national du cinema et de l’image animee (CNC) has an annual film budget of ¥80 billion ($713 million).”
The government’s Cool Japan initiative, he notes, has a similarly substantial budget, of ¥20 billion ($178 million), but it goes “to all of Japanese culture, including anime and food, not just to films.”
“The amount of money it devotes to films is probably not that great,” he adds.
The reason for this relative lack of support, Fukada believes, is the government’s inability to decide “whether films are an industry or culture.”
“In France, the government’s film budget is thought of as a way to protect cultural diversity,” he says. “Diversity is not just films that millions of people see. Those films should co-exist with films that hundreds of thousands of people see.”
In that sense, Fukada says, Japan is still a developing country when it comes to budgeting and planning to support culture.
“In Japan films are considered an industry, so you just have support for what sells. It’s the Hollywood business model. Hollywood movies sell around the world as a matter of course. Japanese films are in the Japanese language, so they’re a kind of minority — you can’t sell them abroad like Hollywood films. It’s a mistake to stick only to the Hollywood model.”
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/culture/2017/03/10/films/fukadas-filmmaking-breath-fresh-air/
Source:
Fukada’s filmmaking a breath of fresh air
I'm talking about SONG JOONG-KI and SONG HYE-KYO whose fanbase as a couple started when they starred in the big hit Descendants of the Sun. 
