The story takes place on a film set in Java at a Japanese POW camp in 1942. It is about a complex relationship between a rebellious prisoner, David Bowie and camp commandant Ryuichi Sakomoto who is obsessed by Bowie's attitude.
For all the praise heaped upon Oshima's admittedly ambitious film about East-West relations in the microcosm of a Japanese PoW camp during World War II, it's far less satisfactory than most of his earlier work.
The film’s attention is split fairly evenly across the major characters, and their interactions are consistently fascinating in the way they illustrate both the cultural divide and the halting attempts to somehow bridge it.
From Oshima's later career... most notable is this bilingual, end-of-WWII tearjerker about forgiveness and understanding between cultures, which could have been dubbed The Man Who Fell to Java.
Fine performances by Conti, Takeshi (brilliant in his first dramatic role), Sakamoto (a Japanese pop star in his film acting debut who also contributed the memorable score), and Bowie enhance this provocative film.
The context and frequent incontinence of the execution bring the film uncomfortably close to the pseudophilosophical bondage fantasies of Yukio Mishima.
David Bowie is outstanding as the defiant British prisoner whose erotic appeal undoes the Japanese commandant, played by Sakamoto, who was at the height of his fame as a musical icon in Japan
Mr. Oshima has staged the film in a spacious tropical setting and filled it with a great number of extras. Even so, Mr. Bowie always stands out from the crowd.
Film4
May 24, 2003
A memorable story of understanding across cultures.
