Nobi (film)

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Movie
German title Nobi / fire in the grasslands
Original title Nobi
Country of production Japan
original language Japanese
Publishing year 1959
length 104 minutes
Age rating FSK 16
Rod
Director Kon Ichikawa
script Natto Wada based on the novel of the same name by Shōhei Ōoka
production Masaichi Nagata for Daiei
music Yasushi Akutagawa
camera Setsuo Kobayashi
cut Tatsuji Nakashizu
occupation

Nobi ( Japanese 野火 ) is a 1959 Japanese anti-war film directed by Kon Ichikawa . In Germany, where it was shown for the first time in 1961, it also ran under the second title Feuer im Grasland .

The film is based on the novel of the same name by Shōhei Ōoka , which was also published in German as Feuer im Grasland .

action

Second World War in the Pacific, spring 1945 .

On the Philippines island of Leyte, the war is raging in its final phase between the Japanese and the Americans. The resistance against the American superiority threatens to collapse, the fragmented remnants of the Japanese military power are withdrawing. The beaten soldiers try to fight their way to the last remaining Japanese beachhead on the coast. Japanese ships are waiting there, which the dispersed troops could bring home.

For the lung-sick soldier Tamura, this looming total collapse also means a complete reorientation of his entire existence. Nobody feels responsible for him anymore, and he doesn't find any help in the hospital either. Abandoned by God, the world and his comrades, he wanders aimlessly through the Philippine island jungle. Constant rain, the fear of death of being discovered and shot by the enemy, constant hunger and rapidly increasing physical weakness are his constant companions. After all, the smoke signals of the insular partisans, called Nobi in Japanese , are his last hope: that of human closeness.

At the risk of falling into the hands of the enemy, Tamura goes to an abandoned village, where he meets a local, young couple. At the sight of his appearance, the girl, who misunderstands his appeasement gestures, cries out in horror. Tamura reflexively shoots at her and kills the young woman. Then he collapses. In this state he is found by another scattered man, compatriot Nagamatsu. He lives with his comrade, the wounded soldier Yasuda, hidden in a cave, waiting for the war to end. Nagamatsu provides the two exhausted people with meat, "monkey meat" as he says. But Tamura has not yet seen any monkeys on Leyte. One day when he had to watch Nagamatsu attack the slain Yasuda, he shot Nagamatsu down. With hands raised, Tamura goes in the direction of the "Nobi" of the partisans.

Production notes and awards

Nobi was shot in 1959 and premiered in Japan on November 3rd of the same year. Since its premiere it has received a number of national and international awards:

  • the Kinema Jumpō Prize in the categories of Best Actor and Best Screenplay (1960)
  • the Blue Ribbon Award in the categories Best Director and Best Cinematography (1960)
  • the award for the best actor at the Mainichi Eiga Concours (1960)
  • the first prize of the Locarno Film Festival in the category Best Director (1961)

Reviews

The following can be read in Atlas film booklet 22: "Director Ichikawa depicts the dehumanization of man with inevitable consistency. The cruelty of the world around Tamura is not portrayed with the means of crass realism. Ichikawa increases the incomprehensible reality by means of an almost lyrically composed sequence of images that forces the viewer a distance from the events. From this distance, however, the monstrousness of the events becomes all the more noticeable. "

In Kay Weniger's Das Großes Personenlexikon des Films , the following can be read in Ichikawa's biography: “A recurring aspect was Ichikawa's criticism of militarism, he was considered one of the toughest accusers against the inhumanity and bestiality of war (“ Friends to the last ”) he denied any adventure romance. For Ichikawa, war meant that people who were already brutalized by extreme situations, as in his most outstanding work "Nobi", are thrown back on their cannibalistic primal instincts. "

Reclam's film guide wrote about “Nobi”: “One of the few war films that rule out any misunderstanding of war as a“ fair, exciting duel ”. War means here hunger, dirt and constant fear of death. War leads people into a borderline situation in which they are no longer human. Cannibalism is a sign of this end point. After this experience, Tamura fled to the partisans, from whom he can hardly expect pardon, but who are at least human. Ichikawa made this clear in a very direct realism without pathos or symbols. "

The Lexicon of International Films writes: "An important Japanese film about the barbarism of war: with reportage-like directness, director Ichikawa describes how scattered soldiers in the Philippines sink into cannibalism in need."

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Atlas film booklet 22, atlas retro program: Nobi. 1963
  2. ↑ Kay Less : The film's great personal dictionary . The actors, directors, cameramen, producers, composers, screenwriters, film architects, outfitters, costume designers, editors, sound engineers, make-up artists and special effects designers of the 20th century. Volume 4: H - L. Botho Höfer - Richard Lester. Schwarzkopf & Schwarzkopf, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-89602-340-3 , p. 143.
  3. ↑ Reclams Filmführer, by Dieter Krusche, collaboration: Jürgen Labenski. P. 438. Stuttgart 1973.
  4. ^ Nobi in the Lexicon of International FilmsTemplate: LdiF / Maintenance / Access used , accessed on October 17, 2013.

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