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Has anyone else seen this yet? It was just released by Kino Lorber on DVD in the US (it came out in China in 2009), it's pretty intense stuff. At almost two and a half hours it seems a bit long but it's one of the most legitimately unsettling and involving war films I've seen in a long, long time. It basically starts off with the Japanese invasion of Nanking in the Second World War and then goes on to document the occupation, the refugee camps, the comfort women and all the various atrocities that took place there - in that regard it's pretty graphic, though never Men Behind The Sun style over the top.
It's all shot in black and white and sometimes goes a little far with the shakey cam in the war scenes but it's a pretty moving picture. Despite the fact that it has a massive cast it narrows its focus to only a few core characters - and it's actually rather fare in its depiction of one specific Japanese soldier, completely humanizing him and even asking for the audience's sympathy towards him, which is something I didn't expect given how nationalist a lot of Chinese films can be.
It's grim, depressing, frequently horrifying but very, very, very well made - definitely worth checking out if you've got an interest in the subject matter.
It's all shot in black and white and sometimes goes a little far with the shakey cam in the war scenes but it's a pretty moving picture. Despite the fact that it has a massive cast it narrows its focus to only a few core characters - and it's actually rather fare in its depiction of one specific Japanese soldier, completely humanizing him and even asking for the audience's sympathy towards him, which is something I didn't expect given how nationalist a lot of Chinese films can be.
It's grim, depressing, frequently horrifying but very, very, very well made - definitely worth checking out if you've got an interest in the subject matter.
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