View topic - Arashi :: jdorama.com

"But by the end of the film, I was convinced that the second chapter of Clint's World War II epic was aptly named. Now in contrast to Flags, Letters is completely told through the Japanese point of view. And it is every bit as good as Flags, maybe even better. Now I'm not exactly sure how everything in Oscarland plays out, but it could very well earn Clint Eastwood a Best Foreign Language Film Oscar, as strange as that may seem.

The film begins with the excavation of a cave on the island of Iwo Jima in the year 2005. As several Japanese archaeologists investigate the remains of what appears to be an underground command center, they begin to dig up the sediment and finds what appears to be what they've been looking for all along. Suddenly, we jump back to pre-invasion Iwo Jima, where we see hundreds of Japanese infantrymen digging their foxholes and sandbagging trenches preparing for the incoming American invasion.

We are first introduced to a weak and inexperienced soldier named Saigo, who is perfectly played by Kazunari Ninomiya. Ninomiya truly carries the film, even showing moments of brilliance. xxayuxx:that wouldn't be too hard for him to act wouldn't it? coz he is brilliant!
He also provides the film with a sense of innocence that seems to stamp an exclamation mark on Clint Eastwood's message that young men, on both sides of the war, were placed in situations that they didn't understand nor support. xxayuxx:no wonder clint loves nino so much!

After arriving on the island by plane, Ken Watanabe's character, General Tadamichi Kuribayashi, quickly takes an affirmative command of the Japanese soldiers-in-waiting and prepares them for what they believe is the last line of defense. Ken Watanabe's portrayal of the fearless general solidifies himself to being Japan's greatest acting export since Toshiro Mifune. Throughout the film, Clint provides us with short flashbacks showing us where the main characters of the story came from and what they left behind. And as I'm sure you can imagine, most of the flashbacks are told as the soldiers write home to their loved ones. xxayuxx:the part where nino wrote to his wife saying that the letter may not even reached her Shameful Cry

Excellently scripted by Iris Yamashita, the flashbacks reach deep within your heart to humanize and attach the audience to the main characters. As the invasion begins, we get to see the Japanese side patiently waiting for the orders to fire. Similar to Flags, where the Japanese side was basically a faceless army, the American side in Letters is also a virtually faceless army. And it is here where Clint begins to connect his two masterpieces in somewhat of a Roshomon-style war piece. Now I must admit that before seeing the film, I thought there would be more incidents connecting the two films.

But Clint does decide to show us the horrifying scene where Japanese soldiers, one by one, voluntarily blow themselves up using hand grenades. We also see what happens to the American soldiers who are unfortunate enough to be pulled down and kidnapped through the hundreds of underground passages. All are extremely intense scenes that are still embedded in my memory. By the end of the film, we are left with Ken Watanabe's character General Kuribayashi, critically wounded and dragged to safety by Kazunari Ninomiya's character Saigo. In the final days of fighting and bearing witness to the atrocities of war, Saigo has developed into a battle-hardened soldier. As the general dies, Saigo finds himself surrounded by several U.S. soldiers.Not giving up, he desperately swings a shovel in defense and is finally knocked down to the ground. Later, as he lies on a stretcher alongside hundreds of wounded soldiers, he smiles off in the distance at the setting sun. xxayuxx:he's the last SAMURAI!!!! i must WATCH this!!!

We jump back to the excavation of the cave in 2005. The Japanese archaeologists finally dig up an old leather case containing the letters from all of the Japanese soldiers that never made it back home. As the letters fall to the ground, we quietly hear the voices of ghosts, the Japanese soldiers' last words to their loved ones back home.