The city of live and death (Nanjing, Nanjing) Experience shapes the relationship

This Friday, I went to watch the film “The city of live and death (Nanjing, Nanjing)”. It took me back Nanjing in 1937 to review that holocaust. The entire film used only two colors, white and black. The file uses the common third person view. No narrator, no psychological description. Obviously, the director doesn’t want to give us any his opinion. All of these make the film seems much realistic.

The protagonist is a japanese soldier called Jiaochuan (I don’t know how to spell his name in english, so I use pinyin). He has a friendly lovely face. When he didn’t wear soldier’s uniform, it’s hard to contect him with war. However he was there, Nanjing. Through the film, we can see his doubt about this war and killing people. When he saw japanese soldiers were killing the citizen in Nanjing, he did not like other japanese soldier beside was smiling. The director uses many camera to describ how powerless Jiaochuan was in that war, in that holocaust. He cannot stop people dieing, he cannot japanese soldier rape chinese woman, he cannot protect the woman he loved. There was a camera, japanese took all men away from the orotected area. Then after negotiation, japanese allowed each woman can take only one man back. The chance of this negotiation was created by Jiaochuan. However there were too many men, some women can only choose one from their hasbands and sons. This time a woman without hasband, she disguised to take back man. One time, two times, at this third time, she was captured by japanese soldiers. She knew her following fate, that was a comfort woman in japanese troop until she die. When she passed Jiaochuan, she asked Jiaochuan to kill her in english. Then she was taken away. Then a sound of pistol shoot. Jiaochuan shooted her. Jiaochuan knew he cannot save her, so that’s the biggest mercy for her. That is a powless felling. This powless felling accompanyed with audiences from the beginning to the end. Jiaochuan used to have love. He loved a comfort woman because that woman can console his soul but not body. He said to his comrade, he will marry her. However, the real is cruel, that woman had been sackless. The only her wish was getting back Japan. So every time Jiaochuan went to find her, he will bring some stuffs from Japan to please her. One time, Jiaochuan went to find her, but he got the massage of her death. Jiaochuan lost his last strut. At the end of the film, Jiaochuan and another soldier was asked to killed two chinese people. Jiaochuan released them and said his last sentence “to live is much harder than to die” to another soldier. That soldier bowed to Jiaochuan then walked away. A few minates latter, Jiaochuan killed himself.

The war is demned because we can see too many powless people in wars. I believe everyone yearns happiness. However, war destroys people’s wish. Through Jiaochuan, we can see that was not only chinese people got hunt. As invader, the normal japanese soldiers were also powerless. “The city of live and death” makes me think another film call “The purple sun”(I translate straightly). “The purple sun” shows both sides’ people’s damage in WW2 in China and Japan. In present day, many people hate japanese. That is a kind of enmity between two races. So how can we see our relationship through previous experience? I think to hate is not a right way. We should take off the load from history and seek a new bright relationship. This doesn’t mean we will forgive or forget Japan until Japan can apologize to China offically.