At the Festival of new Japanese Film 2015 JAPAN CUTS,
Sanchu Uprising: Voices at Dawn directed by Juichiro Yamasaki was selected as the final film to be shown on the last day of the festival.
This is the program of the festival:
Festival of New Japanese Film July 9–19, 2015
This site also includes a short description of the film.
I saw this film for the first time on December 27, 2014 after the art tour in Maniwa City on that day.
There was a movie showing at Hishio Art Gallery in Katsuyama district of Maniwa City.
After I learned about the Sanchu Uprising in Edo Period during the bus tour, visiting monuments of the victims of the uprising, and seeing the digest version of interview film about the uprising, the film is still difficult to understand.
According to Juichiro Yamasaki, the director of this film, everything on the screen is easy to understand with subtitles and repetitions.
He told us that he wants each audience to think hard to understand the film.
Accordingly, I tried very hard to understand what this film and/or this director is trying to convey.
As a scholar/reading of foreign literature, a fan of foreign films, and a traveler in foreign countries, I think I am quite accustomed to being in the situation which is unknown to me.
In that situation, I often try to pick up every bit and piece of what I could barely understand, and try to make sense of something.
I can understand something little or nothing at all.
I feel as if I were watching a foreign movie.
One time I watched a film of
Otoko wa Tsurai yo series, I had an experience that I was able to clearly understand how the characters feel, what the lines of the actors mean and things like that because it was a Japanese movie and I am a Japanese.
I felt really comfortable to see the Japanese film, but this time, although the film is Japanese I was not able to feel that I could understand every detail of the film.
But I had to have a long and hard think during the film.
This is a kind of movie we would like to come back to again and again, and every time we see the film, we can find something new.
Also this film is is based on a historic event in Maniwa City, it motivates us to learn about the history of the area.
I have found this film has something in common with Shakespearean dramas, perhaps in depictions of the crowd, and use of an artwork (namely Katsuyama Hariko created by Atsuki Takamoto.
Also I found that Director Yamasaki make the most use of his local connections, like Sofia Coppola did in her film
Lost in Translation (2003).
I enjoyed the talk show of Director Juichiro Yamasaki, Producer Hirotaka Kuwahara, and Artist Atsuki Takamoto after the film showing.
