Privacy policy
Last updated: 11 November 2026
This policy explains what personal information Japanese Film Club collects when you use japanesefilm.club, why we collect it, who we share it with and what your rights are.
Who we are
Japanese Film Club is run by MadeGood Films Ltd, a company registered in England and Wales (company number 06728966). Our registered office is 1b Unit 2, Shelford Place, London N16 9HS, United Kingdom.
We are the “controller” of your personal information, which means we decide how it is used. We are registered with the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) under registration number [ICO registration number].
If you have any questions about this policy or your information, email us at info@japanesefilm.club.
What we collect
When you create an account: your email address (which is also your username), your password (stored in scrambled form, so we can’t read it) and whether you want our newsletter.
When you buy cinema tickets: your email address, the screening, the number of tickets, the price, your newsletter choice and a payment reference from Stripe.
When you order from our shop: your name, email address, postal address, the items you ordered, the prices, your newsletter choice and payment and customer references from Stripe.
When you rent or buy a film to watch online: your email address, the film, the price, the date you bought it, when you started watching a rental and a payment reference from Stripe.
When you watch a film online: how many minutes of each film you watch, and on which day. The site records this about every 30 seconds while a film is playing.
When you sign up for our newsletter: your email address and where on the site you signed up (for example the home page, a film page or the checkout).
How you found us: if you agree to non-essential cookies, we record the pages you visit on your way to signing up or buying. We keep this with your account or purchase. See our Cookie policy.
When you contact us: your email address and whatever you tell us.
Payment cards: we never see or store your card details. Payments are handled entirely by Stripe.
Why we use it, and our legal basis
UK data protection law says we must have a legal reason, or “lawful basis”, for each way we use your information.
| What we do | Lawful basis |
|---|---|
| Run your account, process your orders, send tickets and receipts, deliver shop orders and give you access to films | Contract: we need it to provide what you’ve asked for |
| Send you our newsletter | Consent, if you signed up through our newsletter form or ticked the box when creating an account. If you bought tickets or shop items, legitimate interests: telling our customers about similar screenings, films and products. You can untick the box at checkout, and unsubscribe at any time using the link in every email |
| Count viewing minutes to report totals per film to the film’s distributors | Legitimate interests: we must report viewing to the companies that license films to us. Distributors only ever see totals per film, never who watched |
| Use viewing minutes to plan our programme and to recommend films to you | Legitimate interests: to run and improve the club. You can object at any time (see Your rights) |
| Analytics and advertising cookies and pixels, including telling Meta and TikTok when you buy tickets | Consent: only if you accept them in our cookie banner. See our Cookie policy |
| Record how you found us | Consent: only if you accept non-essential cookies |
| Protect the site from spam and fraud, and keep backups | Legitimate interests: to keep the site and your information secure |
| Keep sales records for tax and accounting | Legal obligation |
We don’t make any decisions about you by purely automated means that have legal or similarly significant effects. Film recommendations are just suggestions.
Who we share it with
We don’t sell your information. We share it only with these services, which work for us and may only use it to provide their service:
- Stripe: takes card payments.
- EmailOctopus: sends our newsletter.
- Our video streaming service: streams the films you rent or buy.
- Hosting.com: hosts our website and its database on a server in London, and sends our ticket and receipt emails from that server.
- Cloudflare (Turnstile): checks newsletter sign-ups for spam bots.
- Google Fonts and jsDelivr: supply fonts and website code. Your browser contacts them when you load our pages, so they see your IP address.
- Google Analytics: measures how people use the site. Only with your consent.
- Meta (Facebook and Instagram) and TikTok: measure our adverts. Only with your consent. When you buy tickets, we may send them your email address in scrambled (“hashed”) form, your IP address and browser details, so they can tell whether an advert led to the sale.
- Distributors: we share viewing totals per film. These never identify you.
- Venues: we sometimes share your email address with the cinema showing your screening, so they can check you in.
We may also share information if the law requires it, or to protect our rights or someone’s safety.
Information sent outside the UK
Some of these services store or process information outside the UK:
- Our website and its database are on a server in London.
- Stripe, our video streaming service, Google, Meta, TikTok and Cloudflare may process information in the United States and other countries. Where they do, they rely on safeguards recognised under UK law, such as the UK–US “data bridge” or the UK International Data Transfer Agreement.
How long we keep it
- Account: for as long as it’s open. If you’ve bought a film, we keep your account so you can keep watching it. If you haven’t, we delete your account after 6 years with no sign-in or purchase.
- Purchase records (tickets, shop orders, rentals and purchases): 6 years after the end of the financial year of the sale, because tax law requires it.
- Viewing minutes: 6 years. After that we keep totals per film only.
- How you found us: kept with your account or purchase record, for the same time.
- Emails you send us: 6 years after we last hear from you.
- Newsletter: until you unsubscribe. We then keep your email address on a “do not email” list so we don’t contact you again by mistake.
How we keep it safe
Passwords are stored in scrambled form, card payments are handled by Stripe, and access to our systems is limited to MadeGood Films. Customer records are backed up every hour to a computer we control.
Your rights
You have the right to:
- get a copy of the information we hold about you
- have wrong information corrected
- have your information deleted, where we have no legal reason to keep it
- restrict how we use your information
- receive information you gave us in a format you can take elsewhere
- object to us using your information for our legitimate interests, including recommendations
- withdraw your consent at any time, for example by unsubscribing from the newsletter or changing your cookie settings
To use any of these rights, email info@japanesefilm.club. We’ll reply within one month. There’s no charge.
If you’re unhappy with how we’ve handled your information, please tell us first so we can try to put it right. You can also complain to the Information Commissioner’s Office at ico.org.uk/make-a-complaint or on 0303 123 1113.
Children
Our site isn’t meant for children under 13, and some of our films are rated 18. We don’t knowingly collect information from children under 13.
Changes to this policy
If we change this policy, we’ll update it here and change the date at the top. If the changes are significant, we’ll tell customers by email.