[Son of the Earth] Love and Pain Beyond Borders between China and Japan

What is "Chinese"?

"I am the child of the earth, this land gave birth to me, he is my father, she is my mother..."

Matsumoto was silent and looked at the Three Gorges with tears in his eyes. He knew that what Lu Yixin said meant that the father and son would part forever...

More than 20 years ago, there was a co-production film called "Son of the Earth", which was filmed by the largest public media in China and Japan:

China Central Television, Japan's NHK television.

To a large extent, "Children of the Earth" represents the official reflection of China and Japan in that era.

"Son of the Earth" is a very touching masterpiece. The film invested more than 2.5 billion yen and was broadcast in 10 episodes (the 14-episode version on the Internet was edited in Taiwan, so there is a Taiwanese narration at the beginning of each episode). The cost is as high as 180 million yen. This film, with 80% of its lines in Chinese, received a huge response after it was broadcast in Japan. It was replayed three times within half a year, and it was one of the highest-rated works in Japanese history.

The film tells the story of Japanese orphans in China after the end of World War II. They were the most special group in the Sino-Japanese war. They were of Japanese blood, but they were raised by Chinese parents and were nurtured by Chinese civilization.

This is a love that transcends race, and a pain that lasts for decades.

This work is quite similar to Furong Town. The ordinary affection between Lu Yixin and his father has become unusual due to the times.

The protagonist Lu Yixin grew up in China, reads Chinese history, learns Chinese culture, speaks Chinese—not even Japanese, and his parents are also Chinese. There is no difference between any Chinese, but there is one thing that hinders this understanding, and that is: blood.

But is ancestry really the only factor that determines whether a person is Chinese?

Take Lu Yixin as an example. He hates Japan's aggression against China very much, and when he hears a few Japanese mocking China's backward steel industry, Yixin also feels indignant, as if his motherland has been insulted.

After the normalization of diplomatic relations between China and Japan, when Yixin debated the quality of parts with the Japanese representative Matsumoto ( Yixin's biological father), if he hadn't loved China so deeply, he would not have fought so rationally. His "soul" is no longer a "Japanese" in the pure sense, and has been deeply "sinicized" in all aspects.

On the other hand, Yixin still has some memories from before the age of 7. When he visited Japan, he went to Mount Fuji, and some fragments enclosed in his memories came to his mind little by little... At this time, Feng, who was always with him, was beside him. Changxing said, "I think the Great Wall is better," and he felt uncomfortable when he listened to it. That kind of lingering blood, after all, can't be denied by denying it.

Lu Dezhi and Lu Yixin were originally just an ordinary father and son. Apart from the background and prejudice of the times, there is really nothing special about this family. Although lines that emphasize "Chinese" and "Japanese" often appear in the film, as a father, Lu Dezhi's love for Lu Yixin is just an ordinary father's love. It's vague, and for him it's just his own child. He will be sad because he has been wronged, he will be happy because he has succeeded in his career, and he will be exhausted to wash away his sins. This is the love of a father.

However, the times have confused Yixin's identity positioning step by step. Is he Chinese or Japanese? I'm sure moviegoers will have this kind of intricate thinking too.

Lao Huang said it was a shame to forget his roots, so he grew up in Japan, but insisted on speaking Chinese, and returned to serve in China after the founding of New China (Lao Huang was later wrongly accused of being an "overseas spy"). Yixin was deeply touched by this passage, so he and Lao Huang, a Chinese, learned Japanese in order not to forget his motherland.

Just when we thought this would determine the ending of the story, Yixin made the opposite decision to what Lao Huang said at the end of the film: stay in China. Here are his parents who raised him, his wife and children who love him, his relatives and friends, and his partners who have been through thick and thin, carrying his career and ideals...

Identifying with a person's kingdom depends on his bloodline or his soul? I think this will continue to be debated for a long time.

If the soul is the kingdom of man, then Yixin did not violate Lao Huang's words, this is his home, so he said that he is a child of the land of China.

It can be said that this film depicts Lu Yixin's complex identity and his chaotic psychology very well.

The most subtle setting in the film is that most of the Sino-Japanese frictions in the story occurred after the normalization of Sino-Japanese diplomatic relations. It is not only a normal business dispute, but also a contradiction between the cultures of the two countries, and it is also a sequela of the Sino-Japanese war. And this conflict broke out between the biological father and son of Matsumoto Koji and Lu Yixin.

The film did not fall into the stereotype of father and son recognizing each other in the last episode. On the contrary, it took several episodes in the end to show the grievances between Matsumoto and Isshin.

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"Son of the Earth" is one of Yamazaki's "World War II trilogy", the other two are "Barren Zone" and "Two Motherlands".

"Barren Zone" has been made into film and television works three times, the most famous of which are the film version in 1976 and the TV series version in 2009.

The 76th edition was directed by Yamamoto Saf. Unlike "War and Man", which fiercely criticized the crimes of the Japanese army, Yamamoto adopted a more peaceful narrative method this time, which vividly showed the mental state of a Japanese army veteran.

In reflecting on World War II in Japan, the film uses only three small plots.

The first paragraph is that Ichi was being questioned in a Soviet prisoner-of-war camp. The Soviet officer asked him, "Who is the highest person in charge of the Japanese army?" Said, "The commander of the Japanese army is the emperor! Why are you lying?"

The second paragraph happened when Ichi was visiting the United States, at the roadside American military martyr's cemetery, an old lady who came to visit the tomb saw him angrily scolded "Japanese evil ghost!", Ichi was at a loss Wandering around in the cemetery, after that, the pictures of bullets during World War II continued to play.

In the third episode, Naoko came to sternly condemn. Most of the characters appearing in "The Barren Zone" are opposites, and the protagonist Ichichi is a gray character who does not belong to pure good or evil. And her daughter Naoko is a rare positive image in the film. In the play, she once said these two words to her father:

"Dad, I hope you find a company job...don't go to the Defense Agency. Japan wants to give up the war forever, so why does it still need the army? Mom has been through hardships for more than ten years, isn't it because you became a soldier? ?"

"Dad promised me not to enter the Defense Agency... But now, I'm doing a job that's even scarier than that! Dad, what did the government do to us half a year ago in order to pass the new security treaty, have you forgotten? We don't want to start another war, don't fight again, this is our wish. So, don't everyone move? There are workers, students... What is the government doing? Send the police into Congress, collude with the right-wing elements, and ravage Democracy in exchange for our blood! What new security treaty we don't recognize! What fighter jets, none of us want it! Shame on me having a dad like you!"

As a film about economic corruption, there are not many plots that directly describe the Japanese army, but it can be described as brief and sharp.

It is a pity that the production level of the remake of the TV series in 2009 has improved with the times, but the reflection on World War II has weakened. In contrast, it further emphasizes the painful experience of Japanese soldiers in the Soviet Union. It is no wonder that many people in China Looking very uncomfortable.

PS: Yamamoto Saf once thought of making a sequel to "Barren Land" with the theme of human experimentation of Unit 731, but in the end it was abandoned halfway due to Yamamoto's death, which has to be said to be a great regret!

(In addition to the film version of "The Barren Zone", Yamamoto Saf also filmed "War and People" and "Void Zone" to criticize the atrocities of the Japanese army. For "War and People", please see: http://movie.douban.com/ review /4980807/)

"Two Motherland" is about the experience of Japanese-Americans. Different from the warmth of "Children of the Earth", this work is more tragic.

Yamazaki Toyoko herself is a humanitarian. Her criticism of social injustice and war crimes is often directed at the government, while sympathy for everyone else, including soldiers who participated in the war. "Two Motherland" is a work that belongs to this aspect.

Although the Japanese civilians in China were very unfortunate, their misfortune was more or less because they set foot on the colony and asked for trouble. In terms of grievances, the Japanese in the United States are even more injustice. Many people have already joined the United States and do not even support Japanese fascists. However, after the Pearl Harbor incident, they were still imprisoned in concentration camps and subjected to racial segregation. The number of victims exceeded Of the 110,000 people, there is no need to say more about the tragic situation. Those in North China, at least later, many well-meaning Chinese took them in. In contrast, the United States and the Soviet Union and Germany, which were once hostiles, have not adopted such a drastic policy. This is largely due to the racial discrimination of whites against non-whites (PS: German civilians do not suffer in the United States, but in Eastern Europe region is miserable).

"Two Motherlands" was once adapted into the TV series "Mountains and Rivers Burning". I personally haven't seen it. For some reason, the novel version does not shy away from the evil side of the Japanese army.

"Son of the Earth" is recognized as the most well-made, most reflective, and most beautiful story of the trilogy. Its influence in Japan is far from that of "Burning Mountains and Rivers" and today's popular "Barren Zone" (TV version)" can be compared. As a very good TV series, maybe it doesn't need a remake.

The film brought together many stars from China and Japan at that time to participate in the shooting.

The protagonist Lu Yixin is Takaya Kamikawa. Most of his lines are in Chinese, and he speaks fairly standard. "Son of the Earth" is his famous work.

Jiang Wenli plays the heroine Yuemei. Needless to say, her acting skills are also very conspicuous in this film.

One-hearted Chinese father Lu Dezhi is played by Master Zhu Xu. The performance of the old man has made the price of paper towels in Japan rise.

And I really like Tatsuya Nakadai, who plays the single-minded Japanese dad Matsumoto and is the only main character with a lot of Japanese lines.

In addition, the voice actor Iizuka Masaki, who is very active in the animation industry, also participated in the performance.

The theme song "Son of the Earth" was sung by Yang Hongji.

I personally strongly recommend this work to everyone, looking back on the special characters of those special times.