Fires on the Plain (野火, Nobi) is a 1959 Japanese war film directed by Kon Ichikawa, starring Eiji Funakosh - 0ne Hour Fifty minutes

 Available on YouTube with English Captions 

Ten years ago I read Fires On The Plain by Shohei Ooka (1951, translated from the Japanese by Ivan Morris, 1957, 246 pages)

Here is a portion of my post on the novel.

"Shohei Ooka (1909 to 1988-Tokyo) is know for one  famous book, Fires On The Plain.   He was one of the first Japanese authors to write fiction based on the Japanese experience in WWII.   Ooka was a French scholar and translator.    He translated The Red and the Black and  The Charter House of Parma both by Stendhal into Japanese.   In January of 1944 he was drafted into the Japanese Imperial Army and after a brief training was sent to the southern Philippines to fight the Americans and Filipino resistance forces.   In January 1945 he became a prisoner of war of the Americans.

I decided I wanted to read this book as soon as I saw it was about a Japanese soldier's experience in the Philippines in WWII.    A few members of my family still have living memories of the Japanese occupation of the Philippines. "

 

I was delighted to find a highly regarded movie based on Fires in the Plain on YouTube 

The film follows a tubercular Japanese private, Tamura (Funakoshi), and his attempt to stay alive during the latter part of World War II. Tamura and his fellow soldiers are stranded in the jungles of the Philippines after the American army has returned. The Japanese army remnants have taken to the jungle after being driven out of the main cities. The Filipinos, after suffering a brutal Japanese occupation, are in little mood to show mercy on their former tormentors, and light the titular bonfires for communication. Japanese soldiers are reduced to little more than bandits and murderers as their supplies dry up and they are encircled by the American-Filipino forces.

Tamura is abandoned by his unit and forced to fend for himself. He is weak and sick, and must scavenge for food and water. He encounters other Japanese soldiers who have been reduced to madness and desperation. Some have resorted to cannibalism. Tamura himself is tempted to eat the flesh of a dead soldier, but he manages to resist.

Fires on the Plain is a powerful and disturbing film that depicts the brutality of war and the dehumanizing effects of conflict. It is a film that stays with you long after you have seen it.

The film was initially received mixed reviews from both Japanese and international critics concerning its violence and bleak theme. In following decades, however, it has become highly regarded and is now considered to be one of the greatest Japanese war films ever made. 

Mel Ulm