It’s springtime in 1966 and you’re looking to catch a flick at the Marunouchi Toei. It had just opened in 1960 (and still exists today). Will it be the yakuza drama Nihon Daikyôkaku (English title: Japan’s Most Chivalrous), or perhaps the latest installment from Hollywood’s The Man from U.N.C.L.E. in Napoleon Solo: A Companion from Hell? Whatever you choose, when you emerge from the theater you’ll have taxis in an array of colors to choose from. Will it be an S40 Toyota Crowns or an H31 Nissan Cedric? The starting fare was only ¥100. UPDATE: And as reader dokydoky points out, the Marunouchi Toei is scheduled to close for good this summer.
Image: @ichikawakon
I was amazed to see the theatre is still there (albeit with its groovy midcentury breeze blocks covered up), as Tokyo real estate tends to get redeveloped very quickly, especially in Ginza, but it looks like it won’t be there for long. Looking in the Google pictures I found a farewell poster commemorating its run with an end date this July. Sayonara, Marunouchi Toei!
https://maps.app.goo.gl/fvj6mur24UiNvq6C9
Good eye! That makes it even more poignant.
Many of the highways & streets are actually filled in canals. I remember seeing them as late as the 1960’s where the shores were lined with barges. The pollution was still very bad in those years. One by one they filled them in for freeways & streets. I believe Sotobori Dori where the photo was taken was a canal way, way back in the day. During the war, one of the few luxuries for college students were the movie & coffee houses that my mother fondly remembered. Fancy drip coffees & espresso was already popular in the 40’s. My mother used to joke by calling it “mud” coffee. Times were bleak after the war. You can find pictures of cars adapted to burn coal for steam boilers jimmied into trunkspaces.
This is the one place I’m surprised *not* to see an Isuzu Bellel diesel.