ARTS & CULTURE B1
ARTS & CULTURE B2
ESSENCE OF CHINA B3
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MARCH 14 – 20, 2013
How to act in the presence of an emperor
KIRSTY GRIFFIN/ROADSIDE ATTRACTIONS
KIRSTY GRIFFIN/ROADSIDE ATTRACTIONS
FILM REVIEW:
Emperor
BY MARK JACKSON
EPOCH TIMES STAFF
Imagine if the president of the
United States was considered by
the American citizenry to be a living god. Such a concept boggles the
mind. But so it was with Emperor
Hirohito of Japan, his deiﬁcation
reﬂecting the ancient heritage of
divine emperors.
It’s the end of World War II, and
atomic mushroom clouds hover
over Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Japan breaks down. American politicians want to know if Japanese
“god” Hirohito instigated Pearl
Harbor. Someone has to get to the
bottom of it. This is the story told
by the poetically rendered ﬁlm
“Emperor.”
We meet U.S. Army Brig. Gen.
Bonner Fellers (Matthew Fox), a
Japanese expert. His boss, supreme
commander of the occupying forces
Gen. Douglas MacArthur (Tommy
Lee Jones)—he of the general’s hat,
aviator shades, and ridiculously
elongated corncob pipe—hands
Fellers the job.
The decision that Fellers has to
make is whether or not Emperor
Hirohito should be hanged as a war
criminal. Fellers is acutely aware
of the necessity of handling the
case with kid gloves, since one false
move or hasty decision incriminating the emperor could spark an
uprising, not to mention a huge,
lengthy, expensive occupation. He’s
Matthew Fox and Eriko Hatsune in a scene from "Emperor."
Tommy Lee Jones and Matthew Fox in Peter Webber's "Emperor."
given just 10 days to ﬁgure it all out.
Two not-so-minor monkey
wrenches are thrown into the delicate mix. One is Fellers’s affair of
the heart with a Japanese exchange
student he had attended college
with. She had left him suddenly,
without so much as a goodbye note.
Ultimately, she affected his military
decisions to a not entirely insigniﬁcant degree—he steered bombing
missions away from her home.
The second is General Richter (Colin Moy), a brown-nosing,
dog-eat-dog rival who is intent
on shanghaiing Fellers’s work.
Embodying America’s thirst for
avenging Pearl Harbor, Richter
wants Hirohito hanged.
Assisted by a Japanese interpreter
and driver he initially treats badly,
Fellers sets about questioning toprank Japanese war criminals and
surreptitiously trying to ﬁnd his
true love.
Throughout this ticking-bomb
ordeal, Fellers’s humanity ripens
and blossoms, enabling him to
reach the staggering decision that
led to the present-day relationship
that America and Japan have with
each other.
'Endure the unendurable'
This is a fascinating period-costume
account, a riveting portrayal, and
a wonderful history lesson. The
names of Pearl Harbor, General
MacArthur, and Hiroshima ﬂoat
about in most Americans’ subconscious minds, but many have never
heard the story or witnessed the
drama underlying its resolution.
The cinematography is wonderful
as it captures the atmospheres of
green bamboo, meticulous Japanese gardens, and bombed-out
metropolises. It depicts sitting-onthe-ﬂoor-drinking-sake Japanese
culture, and sons bowing all the
way down to the ground in greeting.
There are also conversations
concerning Japan’s complete devotion to one set of values, and how,
when the paciﬁstic emperor told
his people they must “endure the
unendurable,” seven million soldiers unquestioningly laid down
their weapons in accordance with
his divine will.
Very moving are the scenes of
Fellers demanding, from ﬁerce Japanese sentinels, a face-to-face with
Japanese Prime Minister Fumimaro
Konoe.
Konoe says, “Your bombs turned
our children into shadows on the
wall.” He recites a Tanka poem that
the emperor wrote, in all its solemn
operatic grandeur. He bows. We feel
the spirit of Shinto. We learn that if
one understands devotion, loyalty,
and obedience, one understands
the ancient warrior code of Japan.
We learn of how the emperor
lived a hermetic life. How he stood
up to the militarists. How he had
only his word.
Due to the conjectural nature of
the emperor’s innocence, MacArthur wants to meet for tea, wants to
look him in the eye, and see what
kind of a man the emperor is. As
he says, “I never met an emperor
before. Let alone a god.”
There are rules of engagement
when meeting a god: “Do not touch
the emperor, do not look him in the
eye, always stand to his left, do not
take photo opportunity,” and so on.
To ﬁnd out whether the arrogant MacArthur behaves himself,
to hear the outcome of a simple,
heartbreakingly honest conversation between a god and a man, and
to ﬁnd out how America and Japan
transcended their grievances, go see
this ﬁne ﬁlm.
COURTESY DISNEY ENTERPRISES, INC.
COURTESY DISNEY ENTERPRISES, INC.
Oscar Diggs’s (James Franco) hot air balloon sails over the landscape of the Land of Oz in the
fantasy-adventure “Oz The Great and Powerful.”
Oscar Diggs (James Franco) and the witch Theodora (Mila Kunis) travel the Yellow Brick Road on
their way to the Emerald City.
New Oz movie good stuff for the under 8 crowd
FILM REVIEW: Oz the
Great and Powerful
BY MARK JACKSON
EPOCH TIMES STAFF
When I saw the original “Wizard of
Oz” at age six, I became terriﬁed of
the Wicked Witch and hid behind
the couch. “Oz the Great and Powerful” is, by and large, a decent enough
children’s ﬁlm, but Sam Raimi is a
former horror movie director, so cer-
tain images made me, at age 53, feel
slightly in need of the couch again.
Of course, today’s six-year-olds are
used to seeing far worse. Still, ideally
a six-year-old should have a behindthe-couch-free existence.
James Franco plays Oscar Diggs,
a travelling-circus magician with
dubious ethics from Kansas, circa
1905. Being a bit of a rake, he runs
afoul of the resident strongman,
escapes a beating by jumping in his
hot-air balloon, and ﬂies smack into
a tornado.
As we all know, anything sucked
up in a tornado in Kansas will get
deposited in the Land of Oz. As in
the original ﬁlm, Kansas is shot in
black and white. The vibrant Land
of Oz however is multi-coloured,
with multi-ethnic Munchkins. It’s
a new era.
Oscar (Oz) meets sister-witches
Theodora (Mila Kunis) and Evanora
(Rachel Weisz) who think he’s the
coming of the prophesied wizard
king who’s supposed to descend
from the heavens to kill the Wicked
Witch.
Oz wants no part of any witch killing, but when Evanora shows him
the massive gold pile he’d stand to
gain, he decides maybe he can hang
out with them for a little while.
The script for "Oz the great and
Powerful" just isn’t that compelling.
The ﬁlm looks pretty great, but it’s
ultimately ﬂash over substance.
Which is a boredom recipe for anyone over the age of six.
A couple of years ago, Hollywood
was delighted to discover heretofore leading-man James Franco had
serious comedic chops. However
Franco’s Oz is a pretty close relative
of the slacker dude he played in
"Pineapple Express." It would have
been nice to see more of a rigorous
approach to getting the character’s
walk, talk, and attitude a little closer
to the dust-bowl Kansas of 1905.
Michelle Williams as Glinda radiates goodness, Rachel Weisz is a
good, bad witch, and Mila Kunis—
beautiful as ever even under a foot
of green makeup—needs a bit more
vocal training. Witches scream a
lot; it’s hard on the cords. The most
endearing and compelling character
in the movie is a little girl CGI porcelain doll, voiced by Joey King.
In the Broadway show “Wicked,”
Oz fans learned the back-story of the
Tin Woodman, the Scarecrow, etc.
“Oz” is the back-story of the Wizard.
We learn the origins of his sham
supernormal abilities, how he cons
his way into the kingdom and gets
what is perhaps not rightfully his.
What loss must he pay for such
gain? Well, he loses his slick, sleightof-hand, lying, cheating huckster self.
He uses his pedestrian magic skillset, such as it is, to save the kingdom.
Balance would seem to be regained.
“Oz the Great and Powerful,” in
3D, is good stuff for the under 8
crowd—minus the bits of imagery
that are just too scary for a six-yearold. Bring a couch.