09-08-2025
- Entertainment
- Asahi Shimbun
Machinery boss in Shiretoko secret savior of ReraPan film
Rolls of ReraPan 127 film are lined up at a sales event held in Tokyo's Shinjuku Ward on June 7. (Takeo Kato)
SHARI, Hokkaido--The town of Shari is forever associated with the Shiretoko Peninsula, designated as a World Natural Heritage site. But to a select few, it is cherished for another reason, too.
It is the home of a type of camera film that went out of mainstream production three decades ago. Film buffs have 64-year-old Tsuyoshi Mohri to thank for that.
Mohri's main business is agricultural machinery, but he also manufactures the film under the brand name of ReraPan.
His company's flagship products are bulky farm equipment that sells for several million yen (tens of thousands of dollars) and up to tens of millions of yen.
Each roll of ReraPan film is 46 millimeters wide and priced at under 2,000 yen.
Known as 'vest pocket film' or '127,' the film was originally introduced by Eastman Kodak Co. in 1912.
Although Kodak stopped producing 127 in 1995, the film has diehard fans in the United States, Europe and elsewhere. Aficionados rave about the image quality and being able to pop a roll in their pocket.
Using a self-built contraption, Mohri can produce dozens of rolls a day but not a huge number.
While the endeavor requires considerable time and effort for a modest return, Mohri says it is an important business.
4 YEARS IN THE MAKING
Mohri's passion for photography stems from when he used to take pictures of his family.
He became fascinated with vest pocket cameras in 2009 after he spotted a Primo-JR model in a used camera shop.
He bought the camera even though film for it was already out of production in Japan. Imported film appeared impossible to find.
But after he went online, Mohri found a manufacturer in Croatia that was still producing the film.
He contacted the company and bought 100 rolls.
Thinking he would only need 10 or 20 rolls, he offered the rest at an online auction.
They sold out immediately.
Messages of gratitude poured in, and he was flooded with requests to lay in a stock of more rolls.
Mohri swiftly bought 500 more rolls.
His worries whether he could sell them proved groundless as the stock ran out in no time.
Mohri decided to make what had started as a hobby into a business to meet the expectations of photo film enthusiasts, and opened an online shop, Kawauso Shoten, in 2010.
Then the Croatian manufacturer shut down its operation in 2012, citing mechanical issues.
When a German maker followed suit, there were no companies left to produce 127 film.
Alarmed that vest pocket cameras would be rendered useless without film, Mohri spent nearly a year pondering what he could do before deciding to take matters into his own hands.
Mohri negotiated with an overseas film maker to cut the film stock to the width of 46 mm to fit the 127 format and deliver the material to his company.
However, he ran into difficulties searching for a factory to make the spool on which the film is wound.
It took two years to find one that could accommodate his request.
80% OF SALES OVERSEAS
Mohri started selling black-and-white ReraPan film through his online shop in 2014 before adding color, slide and other types to the lineup.
Because vest pocket cameras are still popular in the United States and Europe, overseas sales of ReraPan account for more than 80 percent of total sales.
Johnny Yokoyama, an American living in Kanagawa Prefecture, is a classic camera collector.
After he obtained a camera made in Britain in 1937, he was impressed to learn that he could buy 127 films from Kawauso Shoten.
Yokoyama said that without Mohri, he wouldn't be able to take photos with such an old camera.
He still doesn't understand why ReraPan is lesser known in Japan when the brand is so popular in the United States and Europe.
'It is almost like my mission to continue selling (ReraPan),' Mohri said. 'I want to keep offering the film at a reasonable price.'
