This is a review of the movie, not the original novel on which the movie was based.The Zero Fighter was a very successful fighter used by the Japanese in the Second World War. In this moive a pair of siblings went in search of their maternal grandfather's story after their grandmother passed away. They knew that their grandfather was a pilot in the war and was killed in 1945, they didn't know that he was one of the finest and was eventually killed in a Kamikaze mission.
The movie did not portray the difficult task of tracking down surviving and living comrades, instead it focused on the inconsistent story that was given by the ones whom they were able to interview. Not a few referred to him as a coward, avoiding action if he could, trying all ways to live while they were supposed to be ever-prepared to die for their country and their emperor. Later, as a trainer in flight school, he would fail his students so that they never got a chance to get into action. But then there were those who said that they were alive because of him, who thought he was brave, and even refused to talk to the siblings because they dared to ask if their grandfather was a coward.
In their search for their truth about their grandfather, the audience is treated to reasonably good CGI portraying Zeros in action and recreated Japanese and American carriers, a quick introduction to the battles in the Pacific, and most of all, war as seen from the eyes from the Japanese soldiers. But for a movie that spans more than two generations, the audience is invited to reflect on the difference between the socio-political situation in Japan in these two periods.
First of all, was Kentaro's grandfather a coward as described by some of those who have served with him? For a naval pilot serving the Emperor, death should be 'as light as feather', and yet we have one who tried all ways to live, not because he feared death, but because he knew that his family would need him at the end of the war; after all, the war was lost. Yet it is precisely this determination to live in that climate that led others concede that he was brave later.
The newer generation of Japanese by contrast, appeared to be rather indifferent to the war, their own national education not withstanding. They found discussion about the war either too 'deep' or irrelevant, comparing the Kamikaze pilots to terrorists who flew their planes into the World Trade Center in New York. They prefer to spend their good life and money on chasing girls.
But perhaps the most captivating of the movie was the self-destruction of the protagonist (the grandfather), Myuzo Miyabe, who while determined to live could eventually not bring himself to do it anymore. As an escort for the Kamikaze planes, he witnessed over and again the futility of their mission by the end of the war. The planes were not even able to get close to their targets before they were roundly destroyed. It is one thing for the planes to go to waste, it is quite another for the young lives to be lost so pointlessly. But the paradox is that the more you witness the destruction, therefore learning of the futility of the whole idea, the more you can't live with yourself for being the one to escape death time and again. The pilots you were supposed to protect were not protected, in fact, they didn't stand a chance.
With the current rise of Nationalistic feelings in Japan, many would look at a movie with such a title another attempt at propaganda. I urge audience to suspend judgement until they have watched the movie. It surely hasn't glorified Japan's experience in the war or make themselves out to be the victim of the atomic bombs. It gave fairly equal treatment to Japan's attack on Pearl Harbor and defeat at the Battle of Midway. But most of all, it gave us a chance to know the few who did not buy into death being as light as feather, and how those who have lived viewed that time after 70 years.
