United Red Army (Kôji Wakamatsu, 2007)
"Even if we destroy the armed enemy, the unarmed enemy remains.
We must root out our enemy toxins and our own impurities.
Revolutionary war is the antidote."So, this is batsh*t crazy, brutal as all hell, long, talky, intense and claustrophobic. It also has this weird, offset poetry which mourns the crimes committed (and the people lost), but also inquires into, and weirdly euologises, the people involved.
A movie in three acts, the narrative starts wide open with the student protests and mass action, and slowly closes in upon itself, where black farce and tragedy awaits.
The first act is a chaotic, crowded cram-session in Japanese radical student politics of the 1960s-70s. A mix of archival footage, recreations, written information and narration jam your brain full of radical goodness, and the evils of capitalism and American imperialism. There's a lot of talk, a lot of revolutionary expository dialogue. There're also a lot of students - a very high turnover rate of young, revolutionary idealists - and a lot of meetings. And, of course, there's a lot of factionalism, where the militant-radicals splinter off into their own little cabals. The recreations have this weird, heightened-yet-drab-and-mundane, slightly artificial feel. Maybe it's the first intimations of a break from reality. The world these students occupy is one of intense relations, and very little, if any, outside interaction. Closing down and breaking off. The militancy starts, and any who interact with the outside world are in mortal danger.
The second act is their long march into the mountains, where they set up training camps. The two factions join to become the United Red Army. The absurdist (but maybe a little sadly poignant) touches start now. I loved how they had firing practice, all lined up, rifles on shoulders, and they have to go "BANG!" for the shots, presumably because they have very little ammunition, but it also shows how marginal they have become. Cut off from broader society, they really start to radicalise.
"Self-critique" becomes the tool of the leaders to interrogate, chastise, and eventually destroy the members they deem unfit. The phrase "Are you capable of critiquing yourself?" becomes this god-awful, terrifying mantra, because whatever is said is not enough. Bad, bad sh*t starts to happen.
The intensity of these scenes, through brutal repetition, and through an unwaveringly clear, unvarnished vision, is harrowing. All the more so through its sheer inexplicability. Explanation comes through Wakamatsu's deft handling and remarkably perceptive interpretation of events. The psychological pressure builds, and never dissipates. It seems just plain madness, but it never devolves into cheap exploitation or psychologisation. When one doomed member laments "Where is the revolution?" you can sense that it's a question as relevant to Wakamatsu as to her.
Then, the third act lets of some steam, with some wonderful trekking scenes. But the forces of bourgeois repression are not far behind, and the world starts to close in again. The last remnants take refuge, and a hostage, in a ski lodge. A stand-off ensues. We never see the police, just a disembodied voice, amplified by a speaker. Closed off again, surrounded by repression. Wondering what to do, they hold a meeting. Trapped, some of the dialogue devolves into surreal parodies of what has gone before. They state their case to the hostage, saying "Their real aim is to steal our social consciousness..." but she doesn't seem to care. The final, farcical throes of political consciousness and revolutionary zeal comes with
"That very cookie you ate is an anti-revolutionary symbol" which is possibly the best line of the 00s.
It starts off messy and confusing, but really, really focuses as it goes on. It's also incredibly tender, appropriately horrified, and genuinely curious in trying to get across the whole mentality of this group. I love how we see nothing from the point-of-view of the outside world until the hostage is taken. It gives the whole narrative this wonderfully intimate, crazy, not-unsympathetic tone, and it makes the whole tragedy all that more painful. You just had to be there, man, you just had to be there. ('nother Top 50 film for me!)