The cramped and fragmented compositions of Kato Tai’s 1967 prison drama Eighteen Years in Prison speak to the stifling conditions of Japan in the years following its surrender in World War II. Opening in 1947 and spanning the course of nearly two decades, this unrelentingly bleak and violent film is deeply attuned to how a nation’s men seek to mend their collective wounded masculinity in the wake of a humiliating defeat on the world stage.
Even before Kawada (Andô Noboru), a former kamikaze officer, is imprisoned for stealing copper wire, one gets the sense that the filmmakers see little difference between life inside and outside of prison. American and Japanese officials alike are stealing food and supplies needed by the public, and the chaos and anxieties inherent to in post-war Japan can be felt in the ways in which the men here often collide with one another other as they...
Even before Kawada (Andô Noboru), a former kamikaze officer, is imprisoned for stealing copper wire, one gets the sense that the filmmakers see little difference between life inside and outside of prison. American and Japanese officials alike are stealing food and supplies needed by the public, and the chaos and anxieties inherent to in post-war Japan can be felt in the ways in which the men here often collide with one another other as they...
- 7/30/2024
- by Derek Smith
- Slant Magazine
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