A gifted director brings to the screen a best-selling novel that ostensibly tells the true story of a rejected immigrant community within Japan. The Korean star (Takeshi Kitano) felt the need to change his name from Korean to Japanese, which proves the point. The film is a shocking condemnation of Japanese society gone by: the appalling indifference to violence when committed by an all-powerful father figure, the ghastly suffering of the womenfolk ignored by the all-male police force, and the helplessness of workers before a tyrannical boss. In the background is the lawless ruthlessness of the yakuza criminal mob, available to the cruel money-lender as enforcers for debts. If you ever felt romantic about Japanese society, this realistic-feeling movie will disillusion you. It's no wonder that young women are reported to be leaving the country, if there's any truth to this picture at all. They don't fancy appealing to the gods at their shrine in the kitchen to release them from torture and slavery, instead of telephoning the police and social workers.
The performances are all excellent: it must have been loathsome to depict act after act of insensate violence, all unavenged to the last frame. Hats off to Production Designer Emiko Tsuyuki and Art Director Toshihiro Isomi for a very watchable movie. This is powerful drama, compelling the audience to watch while conveying a powerful and courageous criticism of the world in which it is made.
Why is this face of Japan so cold and indifferent? Why did General Macarthur's military dictatorship not introduce more humane values and social justice in the years following the defeat of Japan's fanatical military elite? This is the aspect of Japan that the Allies detested so deeply: the cruelty and indifference displayed by Japanese leaders to their own soldiers and to Allied prisoners alike.
Let's hope that the relentlessly unpleasant figure so convincingly depicted by Takeshi Kitano could never thrive again in today's Japan, but Blood And Bones does not inspire confidence. One of the fine points of Kitano's performance comes on the occasion when he cracks a very rare smile, and we realise that he is sharpening his knife to cut open a live pig and drain its blood. I enjoyed that moment of insight into his character by the actor and his director. A relentless and brave critique, both of life and of Japan, and a fine film worth enduring to the end.
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