Sunday 12 April 2009

Letters from Iwo Jima and Moscow Mission




I skated over the two foreign films with sub titles watched earlier in the week Clint Eastward's Letters from Iwo Jima was not an enjoyable film to experience. While some characters are fictional the main battle and stories of the commanders is based on fact and two non fiction works. While the film was more commercially popular in Japan than the US although receiving awards and nominations it not without its critics for still being American perspective on Japanese culture and value at that time although marketed as the story of the battle from the Japanese viewpoint. It will be no consolation however to the thousands of families of those who died fighting for this iconic lump of sand and rock without freshwater.

The Russian adventure film I forgot to note but may be Moscow Mission, not to be confused with the 1943 Mission to Moscow was a conventional anti terrorist extortionist caper when the sub plot was the battle between the conventional security and police forces and a group of creatives who succeed with their inspirational and unconventional methods. It is the kind of group you disappear if things go wrong but take all their glory if they go well. While the Japanese film confirmed the Japanese solder as courageous, sometimes brutal but loyal to his superiors and the national cause, prepared to kill themselves than yield to the enemy, the Russian could have been Americans or Brits except for the language.

Today I visited a hardware store for a new toilet seat, as the existing was discovered broken at one of its hinges, a great mystery because it did not happen when I was using although it may have happened gradually through natural wear. The next task is to remove the old and fix the new.. I will leave this until I have completed the chapter of Northern Rivera on Times Past. This brings me to yesterdays completed work on the Arbeia Roman Fort.

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