The Emperor's Naked Army Marches On

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Hi everyone, today’s articles is a review of an obscure 1980s Japanese documentary ‘The Emperor’s Naked Army Marches On’. I suppose you’ll know already if you’ll read on. My great-uncle, whom I've already mentioned in another article, recommended this to me. He had, and maintains, a strong interest in Asian culture, and that in part was developed when he fought the Japanese in the Second World War. For the sake of family, I hunted this movie down and watched it with my brother; here are some of our collected thoughts. *contains plot spoilers- but this is from 1987, so keep your hair on*

The movie focuses on a man in his 60s, Okuzaki Kenzo, who fought in New Guinea in the Second World War. We are told before meeting him that he has been in jail for murder, and has also been in prison for firing slingshot pellets at Emperor Hirohito, a man he considers a war criminal. The film follows him conducting interviews with survivors and relatives, trying to find the truth about supposed war crimes in New Guinea. This in turns becomes an inquiry into the execution of two soldiers for desertion, despite the war having been over for 18 days. The filming takes place over five years and numerous interviews and physical fights. Only when he confronts, repeatedly, the ailing ex-Sergeant Yamada, is there an admittance of guilt and even occurrence of certain atrocities, namely execution, cannibalism and other war crimes.

That’s pretty much the story, but Okuzaki is the real star of the show. He proudly proclaims that ‘violence is my forte’ and on two occasions is reduced to punching the officers who are offering evasive answers. He at once polite, rude and forceful. He is clearly passionate to redress some of the enormous wrongs that his country committed in the Second World War, and have subsequently ignored in the intervening 40 years (the movie was released in 1987, though filming began, I am told, in 1982). Resultantly, the hero is stubborn and violent, though the support of his wife, a sweet, dedicated woman suggests that he is not all bad.

As nearly half a century has passed, we now find all of these men, potential war criminals, as frail and elderly. Okuzaki himself is beginning to get frail, though his spirit still bounds with youth. It is only when we find the truth that his violence against these guys is justified. These normal looking, elderly men, with regular lives and families, can casually, reluctantly admit to cannibalism, murder and executions is chilling. It is also a real symptom of the post-war dilemma that Japan faced. Sergeant Yamada, who Okuzaki fights with, is first seen in hospital. Okuzaki visits him in his hospital bed saying that his illness is a sign of divine vengeance because of the peaceful Post-War life he has led, it is only later that we realised why Okuzaki dispenses with pleasantries.

The Post-War dilemma of Japan, which was occupied by American forces and controlled culturally, made a conscious effort to become a leading economic rather than a military power. By the film’s release Japan was the second largest economic power in the world after the US. The result was a lot of discourse about the War was ignored or edited to best make Japan a country for the future. Japan was essentially stuck in a situation where it had to simultaneously accept blame for its actions; move on to become an economic powerhouse; and acknowledge and sympathise internally its position as a country which had been subjected to nuclear bombs. It is only people like Okuzaki, who are actively pushing for the truth to come out, that remind the country of the negative things which are part of Japanese history.

Resultantly, a lot of the negative aspects of the War were largely ignored and never mentioned. For example, cannibalism and summary executions were common among starving soldiers, but is never mentioned in public discourse, and only very reluctantly in private. One of the former Medics of the group admits that there was a distinction between ‘black pork’ and ‘white pork’ for the meat of native New Guineans, and that of Japanese or White troops. The matter-of-fact way in which he mentions it, in his comfortable house, is a shocking reminder of the lengths people went to survive. It is for this that Okuzaki runs into trouble, and the people he interviews are incredibly evasive. These men accuse him of being rude and invasive (which he is); that they don’t want to anger the spirits of the dead; or that admitting the truth would upset the ancestors of the victims (on numerous occasions a shrine is mentioned as a sign of penance, and Okuzaki himself is seen praying several times). Other people use the inherent ambiguity of the Japanese language to avoid giving a direct answer, and one officer even claims that the Japanese character stops him from telling the direct truth (the truth changes throughout the movie, and its fluidity is symbolic of the situation of how Japanese soldiers fit into the Post-War economic boom). It is for this that he resorts to frustrated punches of these now elderly men.

At the same time, Okuzaki is no saint, his actions leave his wife alone, we are told she dies while he is in jail again after he shot one of the officer’s sons. He seems to not really care about an injury she sustained in one of his fights; He is willing to use her and a friend to pose as the siblings of two soldiers to try to add sympathy to his cause. He also admits at the films conclusion that he himself led a decadent, successful life for a decade after the war before he found his calling. At the end of it, we are left with a tantalising glimpse into Post-War Japanese life, and of scandals and crimes left secret and ignored except for the work of an extraordinary man doing an extraordinary thing. Very interesting filmmaking, and one which you often forget is a documentary.

N.B. These are initial thoughts, which will be edited into something coherent.