Jamie passion and passionfruit!

What was the point of this film?  Make an anti-war statement, balance up Flags of our Fathers, ...?  Somehow I expected a lot more of this grainy almost black and white film looking at the battle for Iwo Jima from the side of the Japanese.  Although it contains a lot of the grim moments like mass suicides that the cornered troops engaged in and the unrelenting negative destiny that awaits them, I felt that the film really didn’t add up to so much despite a certain undoubted class in film making and script and some good scenes.  Ken Watanabe is excellent as the general and Kazunari Ninomiya as the baker Saigo does a good job but all in all I couldn’t see this as the masterpiece that some have claimed it is.  Too slow, too long winded – a good looking film but perhaps too frustrating for me to enjoy fully.  As a ‘diptych’ with ‘Flags’ it works as a fairly complete portrayal of an episode in World War 2.  As cinema it is perhaps less enticing!

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