S  A  T  U  R  D  A  Y  ,    M  A  Y    1

Program 25
Directors Guild of America • 7:30 p.m. • Theatre 3
 
8 1 5
(Japan, 2003) Dir./Scr.: Chugoku Shoichi
Director Chugoku’s sprawling college is all about the mess Japan has been in since its imperial dreams ended in 1945. (The title refers to the date—August 15—when Emperor Hirohito announced Japan's surrender and his own retreat from the status of living god.) 8 1 5 resists the very idea of cohering into a unified field theory—the film careens from ciné-vérité sequences and psychodrama to a stage performance of sodomy and a video documentary about the sex industry. Yet the underlying assumptions come through loud and clear: Japan remains fundamentally militarist-minded and hung up on past “glories.”
Video, 140 min., color, Narrative, in Japanese w/Eng. subtitles
 
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