Q: How does cultural differences affect the representation of children in war films, shown with the films Grave of the Fireflies (1988, Takahata, Japan) and Empire of the Sun (1987, Spielberg, USA)? 

Steven Spielberg’s Empire of the Sun (1987) and Isao Takahata’s Grave of the Fireflies (1988) are two incredibly distinctive war films. They are instantly recognisable among their contemporaries, with Empire of the Sun’s impressive and respectful displays of planes and their pilots and Grave of the Fireflies’ depressing narrative of a slow destruction of a child’s life. I chose these films because I enjoy these films and I believe there can be an interesting comparison between the two. Empire of the Sun follows Jamie “Jim” Graham, as he lives through the events of the Second World War. He gets lost from his parents when the Japanese invade Shanghai and, after a series of events that involve him meeting two American hustlers, gets put into an internment camp where he lives for the rest of the war until Japan surrenders and he is reunited with his family at the end of the movie. Grave of the Fireflies, however, follows two siblings, Seita and Setsuko, through a flashback spanning the film depicting their attempt to survive in the city of Kobe after it has been firebombed by Allied forces. After losing their house and mother in these runs, they move in with an aunt that openly dislikes them. They end up leaving her and live in an abandoned bomb shelter, where Seita starts stealing food as Setsuko slowly dies of malnutrition. At the end of the movie, Setsuko dies and Seita holds a funeral for her, later dying of malnutrition himself at a train station as shown at the start of the film. 

Film Focus

How culture has affected the interpretation of the war genre

Films

Apocalypse Now (Coppola, 1979) (?)

1917 (Mendes, 2019) (?)

Grave of the Fireflies (Takahata, 1988)

The French New Wave is a movement that decided to forgo traditional filming conventions in favour of experimenting with the medium in a way that mean that even some of the most ingrained ideas to cinema were flipped on their heads. Concepts from shooting on location instead of a sound stage or turning away from the camera to leaving in outtakes or breaking the 4th wall were utilised by many filmmakers during this period.

Left Bank – radical, artistic, experimental

Right Bank – established, financially stable, Cahiers du cinéma

Alphaville (1965)

Jules and Jim (1962)

Auteur theory is the concept of a director being more like a classical artist than a producer, likening it as being closer to putting brush to easel than moving a camera.

Some Auteurs and their films of the time include:

Alfred Hitchcock – Psycho, The Birds, Vertigo, North by Northwest

https://web.microsoftstream.com/video/a2558c03-2619-4821-a67e-4bccaf7b2a0a

Rhythmic – Whiplash (2014)

Intellectual – Apocalypse Now (1979)

Metric – Psycho (1960)

The Screw From Another Machine (1926)

Dr Jack (1922)

Miss Mend (1926)

The Soviet Union came around as a result of the Russian Revolution ending Tsarism in Russia. This was compounded by the rise in general power of the Proletariat and the ideology of Marxism which lead into Communism. Soviet Constructivism was born under these conditions, with messages of ending Bourgeoise reign and putting power into the hands of the Proletariat.

During this period of social reconfiguration, Russia was not very rich. This led to a shortage of unused film stock, meaning Russian directors couldn’t film movies at will. However, what they did have was was stock that was already used. These conditions are what led to the major developments in editing that was representative of the Constructivist movement. They couldn’t focus on things like cinematography since they could only use films others had made. Directors like Kuleshov and Eisenstien used this chance to develop techniques related to editing, such as the Gerasimov Effect or the 5 methods of montage.