ARCHIVED ONLINE EVENT - Japan Society Film Club: The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On directed by Hara Kazuo

Date
Wednesday 6 April 2022
Time
6.30pm (BST)
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Booking Details
Free - Booking essential
Priority for Japan Society Members

Please remember to watch the film in advance. The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On is available on BFI player with subscription and on DVD and Blu-ray.

Do you love Japanese film classics, anime or contemporary cinema stories? Do you miss Japan and want to see it at least on screen? Would you like to learn and discuss about Japanese culture and society? Join us for the Japan Society Film Club where we will chat online about films and Japan in an informal atmosphere.

Join us for our Film Club in April where we will discuss the audacious documentary The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On directed by Kazuo Hara in 1987.

Kazuo Hara’s controversial and ground-breaking documentary The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On (ゆきゆきて、神軍, Yuki Yukite Shingun, 1987) follows Kenzo Okuzaki, a 62-year-old Japanese WW2 veteran who seeks the truth behind the unexplained deaths of two soldiers in his old unit in New Guinea in the last days of the war. In his obsessive pursuit to uncover the war atrocities committed by the Japanese army and confront their perpetrators, Okuzaki’s actions become more violent and unsettling, under the impassioned gaze of Hara´s camera. A fascinating piece of cinema verité documentary filmmaking, The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On not only confronts the legacies of the war and the taboos of post-war Japanese society but also forces us to question the ethics in the relationship between filmmaker, protagonist, and spectator.

Kazuo Hara (1945-) is one of the most celebrated documentarists in post-war Japan known for his confrontational films that challenge the official values and norms of Japanese society as well as the objective perspective of documentary filmmaking. He began his career as a photographer, but in 1972 made his film debut with Goodbye CP. Working with his wife and producer, Sachiko Kobayashi, Hara has made films for nearly five decades taking several years and many hours of filmmaking for each of them. Important works in his filmography are Extreme Private Eros: Love Song 1974 (1974), A Dedicated Life (1994) and Sennan Asbestos Disaster (2017). His latest film, Reiwa Uprising (2019) follows the political campaign of trans woman and professor of economics Ayumi Yasutomi to gain a seat in the Japanese Diet as a member of a newly founded party.

Japan Society Film Clubs will take place on the first Wednesday of the month. We will recommend a film to watch in advance and meet online to discuss. Films are often available online for free, to rent or with subscription, on DVD/Blu Ray or on BFI player. When possible, we will invite film experts to introduce and lead the discussion, but the event is open to all and we encourage participants to freely express their opinions and feelings about the films.

If you have any questions, please call the Japan Society office on 020 3075 1996 or email events@japansociety.org.uk.

Booking Info