kbogosian-34228

I am a sap for tragic war stories so I had high hopes for this one, only to be a bit disappointed. The story was simplistic, it basically just follows one character's actions, and his irresponsibility - while understandable since he is a child - makes it a little difficult to empathize with him. It's not a big story about the devastation in Japan, it's mostly just a tale of a child who can't afford any food. There were nice elements as other people say but the story just didn't bite.

Agree with the content of Galcian's review (although he only gave it a 3), go check it out, I especially agree that it's silly to call this an anti-war movie. For a movie to have a genuine anti-war message it has to do something more than merely show a tragic event that is the consequence of a war. This movie does nothing to interrogate or even acknowledge the motivations and moral choices made by anybody involved in the Japanese and Allied war efforts, it just presents a snapshot of the end result. "Sometimes war leads to starving children and that's very sad" is not a novel political message, it's a basic fact that people have known for thousands of years.

I mostly liked it because I still like sappy tragedy movies and as other reviews have said, there are nice elements to this one. If you don't like sappy movies, I'd say don't bother watching it.

Concur with other reviews about the plot and characters, but the cinematography is nice and some of the fighting is very good - gritty, scary, coherent, and accurate to the time period.