Fires on the Plain

A disintegrating Japanese unit on Leyte in the last months of the war. Tamura, a private with tuberculosis, is thrown out by both his unit and the field hospital and begins wandering the jungle alone. Cannibalism starts among the starving soldiers, and the film does not imply it, it shows it. Shinya Tsukamoto financed it himself, directed it, cut it and played the lead. The source is Shohei Ooka's novel, filmed once before by Kon Ichikawa in 1959. Tsukamoto's version is far bloodier and far shorter, describing war not as combat but as the body rotting. The contrast between the green and the red is its one aesthetic decision. Who it is for: viewers who want severe anti-war cinema and Tsukamoto's very physical storytelling. Who it is not for: anyone who cannot take extreme violence and cannibalism.