A few days ago I wrote a piece on DEAD TO RIGHTS after I saw it at a badly projected screening at a local theater. (Those thoughts can be found here) I liked the film but wanted to see it under better conditions. I spoke with the PR firm handling the film and they arranged for a screener for me. Now having seen the film a second time where I could really focus on the film, I wanted to say a few more things.
Seeing the film a second time increased my opinion of the film. I think it is an excellent historical drama about what happened in Nanjing during the invasion. Yes, the film takes a lot of dramatic liberties (the photos were smuggled out by missionaries) and it is a film that reveals probably every sort of atrocity that happened, but it creates a definite headspace that is like concentrated trip into hell.
The other big reaction that I had was the film seemed much more melodramatic. Seeing the film a second time and freed of being on the rollercoaster of wondering who was going to live and who was going to die, I could really focus on the drama, and it reveals itself very much to be a pot boiler. In this case, telling a story with a very urgent and emotional bend to it is understandable.
The one thing that really bothered me this time through was how blatant the jingoistic Chinese point of view the film is. While I am okay with there being (almost) no European faces in the film, it's truly clear that anyone other than anyone who is Chinese, is evil. The first time through I was shocked at the shading of the Japanese photographer as someone who wasn't all evil. Chinese films like this don't usually do that. But watching it again, knowing of his turn to violence changed his character in my eyes. I realized that he never had any humanity and like the rest of Japanese viewed the Chinese as pets. It isn't done that well and it became cartoonish. This really is a complete us versus the world film (as I said the film alters history and removes anything to do with anyone European having any part of anything going on in Nanjing). I know I shouldn't have expected anything less, but the way the film comes off on the first viewing, keeping the focus small, fooled me into thinking that aspect of the film was more under control.
Jingoism aside, I do like the film. As I said it's a balls to the wall, take no prisoners view of what happened almost 90 years ago. It's a moving and affecting portrait of the human spirit.
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