The War

Am 23. September beginnt PBS mit der Ausstrahlung des 14-stündigen Films “The War” von Ken Burns. Die DVD-Ausgabe erscheint am 2. Oktober und kann schon jetzt vorbestellt werden. Der Film beschreibt den 2. Weltkrieg aus der Sicht amerikanischer Bürger aus vier verschiedenen Orten. Erste Kritiken gab es schon anläßlich der Aufführung auf dem Filmfestival in Cannes. Robert Koehler (Variety) kritisiert “The War” als zu konservativ, zu sehr auf die “Heimat” bezogen, hält den typischen “Ken Burns Effect” bei diesem Thema für unpassend, schreibt aber dennoch:

“The realities of life in Sacramento, Calif.; Luverne, Minn.; Mobile, Ala.; and Waterbury, Conn., are recounted in episode one alongside the growing menace from Japan, finally exploding with the unprovoked Dec. 7, 1941, Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. The figures who prove to be most valuable to Burns’ narrative are unveiled here, including POW survivor Glenn Frazier; exceptionally thoughtful fighter pilots Quentin Aarenson, Sam Hynes and Earl Burke; Mobile resident Katharine Phillips, whose vivid, witty and textured memories of Stateside life are easily a series highlight; Sen. Daniel K. Inouye, who saw the first Japanese planes over Pearl Harbor and won the Medal of Honor after fighting on the Euro front lines; Sacramento farm girl Sascha Weinzheimer, held in brutal captivity in a little-known Japanese concentration camp for Allied civiliansin Manila; and John Gray, who offers the view of a young black man in the South during the war.” (Robert Koehler, Variety)

Dieses imposante Projekt, den 2. Weltkrieg aus der Sicht einfacher Bürger, hier der USA, zu erzählen, sollte man nicht versäumen, genausowenig wie die anderen Filme zur amerikanischen Geschichte von Ken Burns und seiner Firma Florentine Films, die auf DVD erhältlich sind (teilweise auch in Großbritannien und Deutschland).

Shuji Terayama

Das 4-Disc-Set “The Experimental Image World Of Shuji Terayama” von dem japanischen Label Image Forum Video ist soeben eingetroffen. Die Sammlung ist zwar schwer zu bekommen, aber zweifellos noch lieferbar. Donald Richie hat eine Kritik dieser Edition in der Japan Times geschrieben, “Through the Terayama looking glass”:

“Shuji Terayama (1935-1983), one of Japan’s most famous poets and playwrights, first wanted to become a photographer. While still a child he hung around the local photo parlor so often that his mother finally told him that so much picture-taking would make him dwindle away to nothing at all…

Terayama has elsewhere written that it is not the camera’s ability to tell the truth that is interesting, but it is its ability to lie. He can make us truly believe in this claustrophobic, closed, dead world, where we are forced voyeurs. This four-DVD set of almost all of his shorter films (the very first, “Catology,” has been lost for years) drags us into his disturbing kingdom — a coherent and forceful expression of an imagination, dreamlike but startlingly real…

That the collection is sometimes upsetting is to be expected — it was intended to be. Terayama is not only the sleeping child, he is also the sinister magician and through the magic of film he reigns over his embattled kingdom…

It is embattled because it is a vision of childhood with all the terror and cruelty retained, and because mother was right: If you take too many pictures you dwindle away. This dwindling process is called maturity. When you have entirely evaporated you are an adult.” (Donald Richie)

Ein Teil der Filme ist 1984 auch auf dem Forum des jungen Films der Berliner Filmfestspiele gelaufen.