Anyone who was planning to visit the city of Imari in Kyushu, Japan in the near future and hoped to experience the planned Akira Kurosawa museum will be disappointed to hear that the project now seems to be officially abandoned. According to today’s Kyodo news, the 100 million yen paid by the city to Kurosawa Production to construct the museum, has been returned, and the construction plans effectively abandoned.
Update: A few extra details are available from the Mainichi Daily News article on the affair.
My partner and I are are so dissapointed to hear that the Akira Kurosawa Museum idea has been officially abandoned. We are huge fans of Kurosawa’s movies and we cannot believe that this man will not have his memory extended to build this new museum.
There are hundreds and thousands of fans around the world that would come to Japan to visit this museum. It would certainly boost toursim to the area and bring more business to the local region.
We can only hope that one day the idea once again encourages someone to invest in building a decent memory of Akira Kurosawa and his works.
We love Japan, it’s culture and people.
Thank you & kind regards,
Marisa