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Summary: Addresses the same problems we are seeing in Iraq
Review: As I write this in May 2004, we are learning of the shocking atrocities committed by American soldiers on Iraqi prisoners of war in Abu Ghaiv Prison.This film deals with the eternal issue of man's inhumanity to man. The main character is an idealist who believes that all men, even prisoners of war, have the right to be treated with basic human dignity. This is the very problem American is grappling with today. Follow the journey of the main character as he tries to implement his beliefs in a Japanese labor camp during World War II. Some psychologists believe that, given the right circumstances, we are all capable of the atrocities committed in this fictional movie or in the all to real Iraqi prison. Decide for yourself whether to despair or to believe that someday we will see the need for treating all men with humanity and dignity.
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Summary: Moving portrait of one man's stuggle against brutality
Review: How many persons, faced with overwhelming social pressures to conform, could speak out in wartime Germany, Japan, or their annexed colonies. This film depicts one such, unusual individual, who in his own small way, tries to make a difference. An idealistic labor specialist is transfered to a Manchurian mining town where he becomes responsible for supervising Chinese convict laborers. He combats his collegues' brutal treatment of these laborers and the corruption that surrounds him. Masaki Kobayashi is to be commended for his fine treatment of a very sensitive subject. Tetsuya Nakadai's acting is superb and the depiction of the environment seems quite realistic. My only objection to this film is that you must buy all sequels in order to follow the story. Indeed, like some Saturday afternoon matinee films, this film ends with a "teaser"....leaving you with a cliff hanging ending as to the fate of the characters. Oh well, I will just look forward to finding out what happens in the future installments.
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Summary: Masterpiece
Review: I can only add to the other excellent reviews for this masterpiece. This is not a light hearted epic, it is a tale based on director Kobayashi's own experiences and is quite simply haunting. Like his subsequent work Kwaidan, the use of the camera and music is breath taking. Though long you never sense the time passing and each take has you there with leading actor Nakadai (who is perfect for this role) whether it be trudging through barren slag heaps or trying to get the last drop of humanity out of the "guntai" and other Imperial bullies. His story is desperate but is also beautiful as you see how this normal man is fighting against the stream of inhumanity that was Japan occupied Manchuria. Eventually he almost has a halo like appearance as his slouched form appears in nearly every scene. This is the effect the cinematography and music combine to produce. I can not heap more praise. If you like serious subjects and character forming epics this is for you. I also recommend Kwaidan.
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Summary: The FilmNotes entry from the Pacific Film Archive:
Review: It is rare when an episode of national history can be interpreted without the burden of illusions, both obsolete and nostalgic. And this is perhaps one of the great strengths of Masaki Kobayashi's The Human Condition, a nine-hour epic about Japan's occupation of China during the Second World War. The trilogy begins with an attack on the inhuman practices within the Japanese Army and ends with a bitter denunciation of Stalinism by the would-be-socialist hero, Kaji (Tatsuya Nakadai), a Japanese soldier who has confronted the horrid face of war and found it unyielding. In grand Dostoyevskian flourishes, Kobayashi suggests the impossibility of an individual altering the ethical standards of a social system. Kaji, driven by an idealized vision of Japan redeemed by social reform, tries to overcome injustice and exploitation during a military conquest based solely on these principles. Brutalized by the very country he defends, Kaji refuses to desert, for desertion implies relinquishing responsibility for his own homeland. Kaji's heroism lies in this exacting refusal to abandon Japan or his humanity. Part One finds Kaji working as a supervisor in a forced labor camp in southern Manchuria where he and his wife (Michiyo Aratama) attempt to better the dreadful lot of the enslaved Chinese workers. Kaji is accused of dissent, tortured, then inducted into the army. In Part Two, Kaji is equally appalled by the horrendous treatment afforded recruits. Given the rank of officer, he tries to install more humane procedures but only succeeds in attracting the ire of his fellow officers. By Part Three, the Japanese army is being routed by superior Russian troops. Fleeing to the south, Kaji is captured by the Soviet army and imprisoned. Here, he learns the bitter truth of the Red Army as liberators. Kobayashi's The Human Condition can be viewed as a single aesthetic entity, complete in its sweep of historical events and visual stylizations. The gargantuan undertaking to dramatize the wilful ironies of the Manchurian campaign never compromises Kobayashi's ability to define the human scale of injustice. Standing-in for the director, Kaji says, "Minor facts ignored by history can be fatal to the individual." It is Masaki Kobayashi's recognition of "minor facts" that joins the poetic to the journalistic in a scathing epic about the cruelties of war.
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Summary: The Lessons of Total War
Review: Masaki Kobayashi, who served in the Japanese Imperial Army and witnessed the atrocities that total war made possible, was a novice director when he was given the go-ahead by Shochiku studios to make a film of Shohei Ooka's anti-war masterpiece, Ningen no Joken. Over three years in the making, it remains not only one of the longest films ever released (in three parts, almost 10 hours), but easily one of the most shattering indictments of war ever realised. Kobayashi tells the story so straightforwardly and so earnestly that, despite some mawkish music here and there, the simple power of Kobayashi's approach pulls off a film which, along with Ichikawa's Fires on the Plain, go far to portray the true dimensions of Japan's crimes against humanity (as much against their own humanity). That Kobayashi, unlike his hero, survived the war and found it necessary to devote much of his career to the exposure of the deep-set aggressive tendencies in Japanese culture.
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Summary: part 1 of one of the greatest anti-war films
Review: The acting is inspiring, the script gut-wrenchingly convincing and the cinematography on a par with that of other Japanese classics. This three-part series tells it like it was without cliches and the impact is restrained enough to last for three hours in each episode. Kaji, an idealistic Japanese man with socialist inclinations is embroiled in the fascist culture of WWII Japan. His struggle as a conscientious objector has universal overtones: the conflicts between mass mania and personal integrity, between nationalistic tribalism and humanistic sensitivity, between the pack mentality of bullying and the vulnerability of someone who stands up for what is right.
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Summary: A True Masterpiece
Review: This is a heart wrenching story of one man's effort to remain true to himself and his beliefs even in the face of adversities.Masaki Kobayashi was promised by his superiors that he would not be drafted for war and this pleased him well as he is about to marry the love of his life. Instead he was instructed to take up a position in the mines where he found himself in charge of chineses prisoners. However this posed a problem since this was taking place in Japan in the World war 2 era. However Masaki believes in treating human life with respect even if they were prisoners working in mines. In an attempt to do this he angered his peers and superiors who then plotted ways to get rid of him. Now Masaki found that in trying to please all he ended up pleasing none including his wife. He was going against the grain and found himself up against the wall. How could he remain true to his beliefs and values? Get this movie and find out.
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Summary: ONE OF THE ALL-TIME CLASSIC EPICS NOW ON DVD!
Review: This is Part One of one of the greatest films of Japanese cinema and certainly one of the best I've ever seen. I saw all three parts of Kobayashi's Human Condition Trilogy during an all night marathon of a worn 16mm print while I was in college seven years ago. I've been waiting for a proper video version ever since. The VHS version was in the crummy EP mode, because of the enormous length of each part, and not priced to sell through. Masaki Kobayashi's work speaks for itself, but I recommend that people refer to his other films listed at Amazon and IMDB. The trilogy contains some of the greatest imagery I have ever seen. It is a grueling war story that doesn't hold back, very much in the league of later war/atrocity films like The Killing Fields and Schindler's List. Although the whole trilogy is amazing in length (the college marathon ran 10 hours with intermissions!) it is very compelling and never drags. It is the story of idealism fighting against the darkness of human barbarism in World War II. If you can handle it, this is well worth getting. The DVD is fully letterboxed to the proper aspect ratio, with subtitles placed fully within the lower black bar. I can't wait for my copies of Parts Two and Three.
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Summary: a masterpiece
Review: This the best movie I've seen in my entire life. This movie is perfect in just about every single way. It's the kind of movie that will stick in your head forever and will never be forgotten.
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Summary: Masterpiece
Review: When Kobayashi undertook the immense project of filming Junpei Gomikawa's popular wartime novel (not, as an earlier viewer stated, by Shohei Ooka - who wrote the otherwise magnificent Fires on the Plain, later filmed by Ichikawa) he had been a director for only six years but had already proven himself as a director of "problem" films, tackling uncomfortable subjects with a straightforward candor. With 'The Human Condition' he emerged as one of Japan's master filmmakers. This trilogy of films is something on the order of Claude Lanzmann's film 'Shoah.' It documents events which Japan has yet to come to terms with - atrocities committed by the Imperial Army in China and Manchuria. Along with Ichikawa's 'Harp of Burma' and 'Fires on the Plain,' Kobayashi's 'The Human Condition' was made at precisely the right moment in Japan, when the war generation had the resources to look back at the war with enough honesty to reveal the full extent of Japan's defeat, a subject which is remains disturbing even today.
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