Death by Hanging

A brilliantly multi-layered film, transforming throughout its entire duration. This is very rarely seen! 1) The documentary, objectifying introduction transitioning from an impersonal depiction of the situation to a raw story, serves the creator's engaged purpose perfectly - the moment when the viewer is forced to abandon the safety of the documentary (ergo impersonal) voice-over and become a viewer of fictional events perfectly duplicates the situation that Ōshima appeals to in the introduction - namely, "imagine if you were a witness to an execution..." 2) The story demonstrates a sense for the best of existential absurdity and Beckettian tragicomedy. But let us not be mistaken - even here, in this "personal" and fictional dimension/film passage, the societal motivation from the film's introduction is manifested. Observing the confused reactions of prison bureaucracy to an unpredictable event; its (own!) effort to fabricate an object with all its might to execute; showing that anyone is capable of a crime, that a guard can enjoy the crime more than the culprit, means a critique of reality. But above all, it is a classic existential Meursault-like situation, when the individual faces their own past and feels like a "stranger," something that can be better understood by others rather than themselves. 3) The final shift of the story into the plane of Japan's reconciliation with the problem of its racism, history, and imperialism divides the plot into an existential drama about personal guilt and the general theme of acceptance and atonement of society's guilt. This division is overcome by a synthesis made by the main protagonist through self-sacrifice, which is much more than an acknowledgment of own guilt - it is a symbol of taking away guilt from blinded fellow human beings, those who only realize their guilt through witnessing an absolute and radical act. Thus, the film returns to its engaging aspect, as the film viewer was also a witness to such an act... (05/02/2015)