The French Zigomar crime-films by Victorin-Hippolyte Jasset, which began in 1911 with Zigomar, Roi Des Voleurs, were incredibly popular in Japan, inspiring Japanese producers to shoot their own Zigomar imitations, such as Nihoma Jigoma and Shis Jigoma Dai Tantei (“New Zigomar: Great Detection”, M Pate, 1912) This phenomenon also helped film-makers to incorporate European techniques, such as faster editing, into the developing Japanese cinema. Unfortunately, it also contributed to the rise of the censorship by police in that country; when daily newspapers began to attribute crimes to the “immoral” influence” of Zigomar on the young, police stepped in with bans and and a new film exhibition code was drawn up, proscribing works which “promoted” adultery, crime, cruelty, obscenity, or moral corruption - up to that point, films in Japan had been governed by laws of misemomo (“exhibition”) which applied to itinerent freak-shows and other bizarre attractions.