I don´t mean it in a mean way! I´m just worried, because it´s really getting rare for me to find Japanese films or dramas I like.
Many things are making 'Eternal Zero' implausible with it´s lack to really go into the reasons behind the character´s motivations. It´s never explained why Miyabe isn´t keeping his promise to return to his wife alive and a reason why he even tries to save his own pilots - which would have provided the necessary depth for this kind of movie. But in the end - and this is coming off as over-glorification and far-right-wing-propaganda, is dying intentionally as a kamikaze pilot himself, again leaving his change of heart unexplained and without any sense. The little indicated glimmer in him for reincarnation makes it an unbelievable corny ending.
What should this scene tell the audience, if not that he ultimately choosed dying for his country over being with his wife and child - that´s nationalism at it´s best. There is a thin line between patriotism and nationalism they could have explored here, but probably that´s an even better topic for 'Hana Moyu'.
More unrealistic scenes is contributing Oishi, especially in the moment when he is defending his grandfather suddenly in front of his friends. And another far-right-winged commentary at the movie´s closing, when they proclaim the actions of all kamikaze pilots was a sacrifice for future generations.
I find the acting very ineffective and mostly at minimum on what I would expect from an actor, some are even overdoing it.
It´s still strange how different our perception of this movie is. I absolutely understand why Miyabe is not keeping his promise to return to his family. Seeing so many promising young people die, completely wore him out, robbed him of all his illusions of life and simply suck out all of his energy. He knew if he´d return to his family as the empty human shell that he was at the end of the war, he´d had nothing to offer his family - instead he would be a burden to them. While he saw that young Oishi (played by Sometani. By the way Oishi is not Miura´s character who is defending his grandfather - that is Saeki Kentaro) has still dreams and illusions AND likes his (Miyabes) wife, so he probably saw that Oishi was the person that could offer his (Miyabes) own family more than he could. But if he wouldn´t die - that would never happen. He did all this for his little family.
And with Saeki defending his grandfather - I could even understand this, regardless of what he thinks about Kamikaze. He just learned and realized what a shitty life his grandfather had and that he died at that very age Saeki is right now - 26! And there were those young guys with their carefree lifes arguing over where they would lay their girls - in Okinawa or Hawaii - and comparing his grandfather to terrorists. Honestly - I can understand his reaction. Kamikaze is stupid - and the movie made that more than clear - but Kamikaze is also not comparable with terrorist-acts, and there Saeki is completely right!. I have the slight impression you are a little pre-occupied about that movie and did not try hard enough to understand those characters. I am absolutely no right person (neither am I on the absolutley left wing though), and I hate war - I even hate simply conflicts, I always prefer to be left alone and rather turn my back. But I can completely understand this movie - and see it as a good and convincing work and argument against war. I never saw a movie that so clearly showed the slow decomposition of a person that was high spirited for the future of it´s country and more of his family mentally torn to pieces bit by bit by the insanities of war, like Miyabe.
Well, yes, it´s an implausible story and his sudden change is still simply unconvincing, also to expect that his wife is going to be happy with another man, she doesn´t even knows, to decide this for her and their daughter out of the blue, just makes no sense and he doesn´t appear to be a broken man yet. If I have to try hard to understand characters in a movie that appear incredible to me, then the movie - director and actors - simply haven´t suceeded in conveying their message. I usually like to draw my own conclusion out of stories a lot, but then I also expect that I get enough background details for it to be possible.
Of course have kamikaze pilots, back then and now, been terrorists, that´s not even arguable. It doesn´t matter if you are using your own body with a bomb or an manned aircraft as a bomb for an attack - a suicide assassin is a suicide assassin, it´s clearly the same. And right there we have another fault in the movie, that they let it look like the Japanese aerial strikes are at legitimate targets during wartime to the audience, which is eye- and brainwash! Even if Miyabe showed a little bit of remorse, it flew away instantly again.
And always remember that the attack on Pearl Harbor was against a country that at this point wasn´t involved in the war at all, it was against a fleet that was orderly laying at anchor at it´s naval base. And not only Pearl Harbor, but Japanese pilots attacked other targets on the Philippines, Malaya, Singapore and Hong Kong in a similar way, causing many deaths among innocent people there, too. How was this not terrorism? Have they depicted it in the movie, to show how really horrible war was? No, they don´t even stick true to actual happenings or try to explain how the war came to be, which would have been useful. And at least a few truly unwillingly recruited young kamikaze pilots should have been added for realism, too. This movie is humbug with an extra big portion of overstated pathos.
Well, even though we are somewhat off-topic now. *lol*
I will not prolong this discussion endlessly, and I have to admit you´ve got a point regarding Miyabe´s wife - this is indeed a little strange - but still in my book he simply felt all he could be to his family after the war was a burden. And he liked Oishi and I guess he had faith that Oishi would live up to the task and eventually his wife will accept that. Just a guess! However I cannot accept if you say Kamikaze is the same as terrorists. Though both use their body as weapon, there is a SIGNIFICANT difference. Terrorist do this out of their free will, while these young men who died as Kamikaze had no choice since they were forced by their country to do so or get shot or at least completely dishonored (and you know what this means for a Japanese!). It´s not fair to label them the same. The film focused on those persons - it took the historical facts as background - there were other movies that explained the attack on Pearl harbor, but it was not the task of this movie to do that - it just used it as setting - and in my opinion it did this neutral - not justifying the INDEED horrible attack. But here we simply have a different perception and most likely will not come together ^-^.
It´s the same, there was no difference. It all started with pilots volunteering by free will out of honor and for their country - the same reasons why suicide assassin do it today. It wasn´t until the last days that they also started to force young pilots into volunteering, merely as canon fodder. It was quite the same like the child-soldiers that were forced into volunteering here in the last war days. But how said, it all started originally as sacrifice by free will and nationalism.
The 'Eternal Zero' is not focusing on historical facts or real persons, in fact it is, beside the Pearl Harbor attack, pure fiction. It´s not even touching the issue of forced volunteers. This was one of the reasons for serious critics. If you don´t believe me, then read at least the following reviews:
Many things are making 'Eternal Zero' implausible with it´s lack to really go into the reasons behind the character´s motivations. It´s never explained why Miyabe isn´t keeping his promise to return to his wife alive and a reason why he even tries to save his own pilots - which would have provided the necessary depth for this kind of movie. But in the end - and this is coming off as over-glorification and far-right-wing-propaganda, is dying intentionally as a kamikaze pilot himself, again leaving his change of heart unexplained and without any sense. The little indicated glimmer in him for reincarnation makes it an unbelievable corny ending.
What should this scene tell the audience, if not that he ultimately choosed dying for his country over being with his wife and child - that´s nationalism at it´s best. There is a thin line between patriotism and nationalism they could have explored here, but probably that´s an even better topic for 'Hana Moyu'.
More unrealistic scenes is contributing Oishi, especially in the moment when he is defending his grandfather suddenly in front of his friends. And another far-right-winged commentary at the movie´s closing, when they proclaim the actions of all kamikaze pilots was a sacrifice for future generations.
I find the acting very ineffective and mostly at minimum on what I would expect from an actor, some are even overdoing it.
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And with Saeki defending his grandfather - I could even understand this, regardless of what he thinks about Kamikaze. He just learned and realized what a shitty life his grandfather had and that he died at that very age Saeki is right now - 26! And there were those young guys with their carefree lifes arguing over where they would lay their girls - in Okinawa or Hawaii - and comparing his grandfather to terrorists. Honestly - I can understand his reaction. Kamikaze is stupid - and the movie made that more than clear - but Kamikaze is also not comparable with terrorist-acts, and there Saeki is completely right!.
I have the slight impression you are a little pre-occupied about that movie and did not try hard enough to understand those characters.
I am absolutely no right person (neither am I on the absolutley left wing though), and I hate war - I even hate simply conflicts, I always prefer to be left alone and rather turn my back. But I can completely understand this movie - and see it as a good and convincing work and argument against war. I never saw a movie that so clearly showed the slow decomposition of a person that was high spirited for the future of it´s country and more of his family mentally torn to pieces bit by bit by the insanities of war, like Miyabe.
Reply
Of course have kamikaze pilots, back then and now, been terrorists, that´s not even arguable. It doesn´t matter if you are using your own body with a bomb or an manned aircraft as a bomb for an attack - a suicide assassin is a suicide assassin, it´s clearly the same. And right there we have another fault in the movie, that they let it look like the Japanese aerial strikes are at legitimate targets during wartime to the audience, which is eye- and brainwash! Even if Miyabe showed a little bit of remorse, it flew away instantly again.
And always remember that the attack on Pearl Harbor was against a country that at this point wasn´t involved in the war at all, it was against a fleet that was orderly laying at anchor at it´s naval base. And not only Pearl Harbor, but Japanese pilots attacked other targets on the Philippines, Malaya, Singapore and Hong Kong in a similar way, causing many deaths among innocent people there, too. How was this not terrorism? Have they depicted it in the movie, to show how really horrible war was? No, they don´t even stick true to actual happenings or try to explain how the war came to be, which would have been useful. And at least a few truly unwillingly recruited young kamikaze pilots should have been added for realism, too. This movie is humbug with an extra big portion of overstated pathos.
Well, even though we are somewhat off-topic now. *lol*
Reply
However I cannot accept if you say Kamikaze is the same as terrorists. Though both use their body as weapon, there is a SIGNIFICANT difference. Terrorist do this out of their free will, while these young men who died as Kamikaze had no choice since they were forced by their country to do so or get shot or at least completely dishonored (and you know what this means for a Japanese!). It´s not fair to label them the same.
The film focused on those persons - it took the historical facts as background - there were other movies that explained the attack on Pearl harbor, but it was not the task of this movie to do that - it just used it as setting - and in my opinion it did this neutral - not justifying the INDEED horrible attack. But here we simply have a different perception and most likely will not come together ^-^.
Reply
The 'Eternal Zero' is not focusing on historical facts or real persons, in fact it is, beside the Pearl Harbor attack, pure fiction. It´s not even touching the issue of forced volunteers. This was one of the reasons for serious critics. If you don´t believe me, then read at least the following reviews:
Nationalists Mission Accomplished
The Eternal Zero Propaganda in the Service of Present Day Militarism
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