Daishi Matsunaga‘s “PURE JAPANESE”
Movie review by Dennis D. McDonald
The basic story elements are familiar:
Young martial arts expert harbors a dark secret he is trying to escape.
A shady mob-linked politician tries to convince an elderly landowner to sell his family land to make way for a resort complex.
The old man’s teenage granddaughter inevitably develops a relationship with the young martial arts expert.
One might be forgiven if this film is overlooked due to its familiar basics. That would be a mistake. There’s much of interest here given how the film is designed, edited, photographed, and acted.
The overriding theme of the film is represented by its title: Pure Japanese. The question of what constitutes “pure” Japanese culture and identity permeates the film in imaginative and even ironic ways.
First, young people are obsessed with an over-the-counter medical test-– heavily promoted on social media--that purports to show within seconds what percent of “pure Japanese“ the tester is. It’s bogus, of course, but everybody’s doing it.
Second, the main character -- the one who harbors a deep, dark secret -- is obsessed with what it means to be Japanese through the course of the film. We do learn why he possesses such insecurity. This affects how he behaves, especially when he takes on the protection of the old man’s granddaughter, who is also being threatened by the crooked politicians and his mob cronies.
Third, much of the film takes place on the streets of an “Old Edo“ entertainment park that is constructed to look like a typical city street in old Japan. Here visitors and tourists visit shops and witness acrobatic displays of martial arts and choreographed sword play. Our hero is one of these players. While he gravely practices his physical arts every morning at a local shrine, the irony of seeing someone so concerned with being “pure Japanese“ acting in fake reenactments of ancient Japanese swordfights is not easily missed.
The film is replete with action and violence. Initially we see the superbly choreographed staged displays of swordplay complete with offstage-supplied sound effects. As the movie progresses, real violence becomes more prevalent until, at the end, we see a no-holds-barred deadly sword fight complete with blood spraying all over the streets of “Old Edo.“
Despite the overly familia plot points, I really did enjoy the film. Acting is universally excellent. One can’t help but respond sympathetically to how the plight of “the little people against the machine“ plays out.
In the end, we suspect that, despite all the retribution meted out against the bad guys by our flawed hero, the forces of change may very well win out in the end, regardless of how racially or culturally “pure” the people are. We’ve seen that happen many times in the West (“they paved paradise and put up a parking lot”) and there’s no reason it doesn’t happen in Japan, either, pure or not.
Movie review copyright 2023 by Dennis D. McDonald
