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Simply Perfect

Good movie but grossly overrated

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

It's no surprise that Shoehei Imamura helped with the planning of Kazuo Hara with his documentary film The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On (1987). It is just the kind of documentary that would appeal to Imaura-Hara follows Kenzo Okuzaki, a 62-year-old WWII veteran notorious for his protests against Emperor Hirohito, as he tries to expose the needless executions of two Japanese soldiers during the war. We learn at the beginning of the film that Okuzaki was imprisoned in Kobe for 13 years and 9 months for plotting to assassinate a former Prime Minister, shooting pachinko balls at the emperor with a sling shot, and distributing pornographic pictures of the Emperor outside a Tokyo department store. He is one of 30 surviving members of a platoon that fought in Papua New Guinea and he is driven to find out why two low ranking soldiers were executed for desertion 23 days after the war ended. Eventually, it comes out that the unpopular low ranking soldiers were executed for cannibalism for the superior officers. Ohuzaki is a piece of work-his sanity is never questioned and he will result to violence to get his answers on camera. These themes of WWII atrocities and anger at those who were in charge are common themes in the documentaries of Imamura as well. Ohkuzaki is aided by his loyal wife and by the end of the film he has gone back to Papua New Guinea to pray for the souls of dead Japanese soldiers, but he film shot there was confiscated by the Indonesia authorities. He decides that he should kill the officer who called for the execution of the two low ranking soldiers, but is unable to kill him tries to kill his son instead. The son survives and Okuzaki goes back to prison for attempted murder, soon after his wife dies. It is a fascinating film that brings up some unpleasant topics that most modern Japanese try to whitewash history-just as these war survivors try to live on as if these things had not happened.

From the mere title alone, The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On is the true-life documentary of obsessive, army-in-one war veteran, Kenzo Okuzaki, and his march to unclothe the truth of certain events during World War II. Okuzaki is a severely committed, subservient, even violent disciple of truth. Thirty years after the war and having been in and out of prison, he travels great lengths to reveal the facts and hold responsible the men who unlawfully executed several soldiers in the regiment he served in during the war. With the victims parent's at his side, he travels to the homes of ex-military leaders who he believes are responsible for the deaths of innocent soldiers, essentially corners and interrogates them, tries to get them to fess up and take responsibility for their misdeeds, and resorts to violence when they refuse to apologize or speak.In several scenes, Okuzaki is seen beating up elderly war veterans like himself, trying to squeeze the truth out of their reluctant, scared, and emaciated minds. He basically acts as a sort of pseudo-God. He's on "God's errand" to punish the wicked by either inflicting guilt upon their consciences, or using physical force to stir them up to repentance. In the true sense of the word, his tactics are amazing to watch, yet very disturbing. Though I do not fully agree with his tactics, I couldn't help but admire how dedicated and faithful he was in revealing the "truth" and serving what he believed was justice. He really believed in what he was doing, even if it made him appear like some religious zealot inebriated on fanaticism. However, his devotion to truth causes him to contradict himself. When the parents of one of the victims refuse to embark with Okuzaki on his journey to discover the truth about their son, Okuzaki finds pseudo-parents who act as the victim's son, yet are lying in order to emotionally stir up the military leaders (or 'pretending' if you want to give it a euphemism). It's ironic, then, that Okuzaki is the so-called orator, defender of truth just as long as you play by his rules. After all, he feels privileged to bend the rules, even to the extent of using violence or lying tactics if it means acquiring the truth from others. In essence, he's his own God.At one point in the film, Okuzaki declares that violence is only good if it leads to a greater end. The end that Okuzaki desired was for war to never perpetuate again into the future. Thus, by using violence to get others to reveal the truth of their sins, he believed that wars would terminate, people would remember the past, and violence would be abolished. It seems a bit contradictory though: does violence stop violence? I'm torn on this issue. On one hand I look at what violence has done throughout history, and no matter how hard we try, violence has not ended violence, but has begot it. Perhaps we need to take a more Gandhian approach and use kindness to inflict hot coals upon wicked minds. On the other hand, I think of my religious convictions: If there is a God who doesn't intend for his children to behave violently, is there such a thing as Godly violence? Justified warfare? According to scriptural texts, there is: Deuteronomy 20, Section 98, 1Nephi 4. Yet to have God's stamp of approval, or better yet, commandment, to take or physically abuse another human life seems a burden I wish to never have thrust upon me. Was Okuzaki right for behaving the way he did? I can answer yes or no. Yes, that God sometimes uses the wicked to scourge the righteous up to repentance, as well as using the wicked to destroy the wicked. No, that I know God doesn't want me to behave that way.To speak of war presupposes that violence is involved. War is violence (and vice versa). The film tries to be as objective as possible in showing the aftermath of what war does to people. It leads them to hell/prison. Okuzaki is on a mission to send unrighteous people to hell, uncaring of the negative consequences it may have upon himself. He demonstrated this courage when attacking the Emperor with a sling for denying responsibility of the murdered soldiers. The film ends the same way it started: Okuzaki has been released from prison only to find himself back in prison. The interesting point is that he always takes full responsibility for his actions, unlike those around him. He even full-heartedly admits at the beginning that he intends to go back to prison after inflicting "justice" upon the war-criminals. That he takes this responsibility is proof that people sentence themselves to their own private, hellish prisons, whether they admit to it or not.

I watched this film for a modern Japanese narrative class, but would definitely recommend it to anyone else. The copy I had made it hard to read the subtitles sometimes, but it was usually pretty obvious what was going on, because at that point Okuzaki Kenzo was usually beating somebody up for not telling him the truth.It is sometimes hard to believe that this film is a documentary, because you want it to be fiction. It is not easy to watch, but whole-heartedly worth it, because even though it forces you to think about a lot of uncomfortable things, WWII was a very uncomfortable time, so it's rather appropriate, that way.

This is the story of Kenzo Okuzai a very strange man who is haunted by what happened back in New Guinea during the Second World War. What happened during the war was that while all the men were starving the officers had several soldiers executed on trumped up charges so that they could be used for food. This is a documentary about his long lonely crusade to put the souls of the dead to rest (ie.to give himself some peace of mind).This is a very in your face film. Okuzai drives a car with a loudspeaker on the top and is covered with what I can only assume is an explanation of his cause. He challenges authority at every turn (he went to prison for shooting ball bearings at the Emperor... and murder) and does what ever he can to get his point across. Its makes you laugh and it makes you cringe (a case in point in the opening wedding ceremony where he gives a speech that is not to be believed, which is funny for what it says, but cringe inducing for when he says it). Okuzai forces you to consider how far would you go to correct a wrong that happened even 40 years before.Watching the movie I was forced to reflect not only what it may have been like in the jungles during the war and what I would do to survive. What is the moral obligations we should follow when we are near death and trying to stay alive? The film also forces you to think about the role of a camera in the proceedings. We are with Kenzo Okuzai all along his odd trip as he attempts to comfort the families of the dead and as he confronts (and assaults) the officers who ordered the executions. There is no doubt that he is aware he is being filmed, so does that make him more or less confrontational? Is his behavior more or less genuine than it would be had the camera not been there? Its a tough call and as you watch it you really do have to reflect on what is the role of a film crew in filming actual events? Can we trust the actions of those being filmed? Its all something to think about.If you get the chance see this film. Its an interesting look at a very odd man. I'm not sure that I liked Okuzai (which is the problem with the movie, he isn't really likable), but he did force me to think about life and film in several new ways.