Comfort Women is something that is harder to avoid though lesser in degree than the entire picture of wronged China

 	
  	Japanese Director Looks at Comfort Women
	

By Paolo Bertolin
Contributing Writer


A scene from “Cycling Chronicles” by Wakamatsu Koji
Wakamatsu Koji (born in Miyagi, Japan in 1936) is one of Japan's most controversial directors. He began his filmmaking career in the 1960s, directing softcore pornographic films for Nikkatsu, to then create his own independent company, where he went on to combine eroticism with overt social and political critique.

Wakamatsu's political commitment is still beating strong in his latest ``Cycling Chronicles,'' already hailed by international film critics as a masterpiece. Inspired by the real story of a 17 year old who, after killing his mother, eloped on an aimless bicycle ride on the road from Tokyo to Aomori. The film was conceived without a screenplay, and by only means of improvisation.

Two remarkable encounters punctuate the boy's journey. The first with an old man who remembers his dead brother, a Japanese soldier who fought in Mongolia and was kept there as a war prisoner, offering him an occasion to condemn the atrocities perpetrated by Japan during the war, as well as to question current burning geopolitical issues.

The second was with an elderly Korean woman who was brought to Japan as a comfort woman, and then left there by her husband who went back to Korea alone. The following interview with Wakamatsu took place at the Turin Film Festival in Italy, where the film had its international premiere.

Question: The two encounters the protagonist makes during his journey have strong historical and political resonance. Were they also part of the improvisation?

Answer: The old man is not an actor, but art critic Hariu Ichiro, a friend of mine who shares a lot of my political views. I asked him to act in the film, just to talk about his 17 years, about the war, about the emperor with complete freedom of speech. I know well his personal story, therefore, even though nothing was scripted, I had a clear idea of what he would have been saying.

As for the Korean woman, it's quite a long time that I have been interested and researching about the issue of comfort women that were used as prostitutes for the Japanese army. I have been seeing pictures of those days with queues of thirty men waiting to abuse these often very young women. These days in Japan some people are trying to deny these events, but I ask myself ``how can they deny when there are such pictures?'' I had been thinking for long to deal with this issue in film and I finally did it.

Always in regard to the issue of Korean comfort women, one has to bear in mind that in Japan there are strong anti-North Korean sentiments, because of the kidnappings of Japanese nationals that mysteriously disappeared, were brought to North Korea, and have only recently been liberated. To me, if Japanese people reminded and admitted what happened with the abduction of Korean women during World War II, they would feel less indignation. I'm not saying what North Koreans have done would become right, but just more understandable…

Q: The way your film condemns Japan's war crimes seems like a direct excuse for the diplomatic incidents with China and Korea caused by Koizumi's visits to the Yasukumi shrine.

A: The problem with Koizumi is that he's just a wagging dog for America. Worst, he has never experienced war, while, unfortunately, all the Japanese politicians who had lived during war times and could speak with wisdom about what war is are now dead or retired. We are now confronted with a spectacle I'm most afraid of, as Japan is making the same mistakes it did in the past, just by sheer ignorance. Contemporary Japanese society and Prime Minister Koizumi are making me so mad that, if terrorism was not a crime, I would kill him myself!

Q: Returning to the character of the Korean woman, it is interesting to notice that she has been left behind by her husband and is still living in Japan. What can you say about this detail? Moreover, quite surprisingly the subject of comfort women has been taboo for a long time in Korea as well, and apart from the documentary trilogy of Byun Young-joo, Korean cinema too did not deal with the issue very much, whereas many Japanese films did.

A: The tale of this woman was meant to be emblematic. It's not based on an actual story, still it keeps a certain degree of truth, in the fact that there are many Korean women who were brought to Japan to be employed as comfort women for the army who still dwell there. Just like the woman in the film they might live all alone, in a hut covered by snow, forgotten by everything and everyone.

As for the silence about this issue in Korea and Japan, what I and many people believe, and this is partly comforted by some documentation, is that in the past Japanese government bribed the Korean government to keep a low profile on the whole matter. Many scholars and documentary makers who investigated on Japan's war crimes were silenced and ostracized. Two directors who were working on the issue died in dubious circumstances. One had been an assistant director of mine, and was killed during a protest I too was taking part in. These incidents have never been fully investigated and this is another reason why I am so mad at Japan today.


werkmeister@xxxxxx
12-26-2005 17:09
	
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