Yasukuni

China-born, Japan-based filmmaker Li Ying (Dream Cuisine, SFIAAFF ’04) returns with Yasukuni, an incisive documentary exploring one of the most divisive issues in Japan and Asia today. Yasukuni Shrine is home to the spirits of those who fought and died on behalf of Japan’s emperor. Enshrined among some 2.46 million war dead are also the Class-A war criminals from World War II, making the shrine a controversial symbol of Japan’s militaristic past.

Li treats Yasukuni as a stage upon which a multitude of people reveal themselves. War veterans, bereaved family members, protesters and even the former Prime Minister Koizumi—whose visits to the shrine have provoked outrage throughout neighboring Asian countries—weigh in on how nations and individuals ought to honor lives sacrificed during a war of aggression. Li, however, eschews polemics in favor of an impassioned but respectful investigation into the Japanese spirit. From dramatic confrontations, intimate conversations and stunning verité footage of rarely seen ceremonies emerge a complex portrait of a conflicted national psyche, one still reeling from the war.

At the heart of that psyche is the embattled bushido spirit, both beautiful and violent. Li uncovers the little-known fact that the object of worship at Yasukuni is a singular sword said to embody the souls of all who are enshrined there. The film repeatedly returns to the shrine’s last surviving swordsmith, whose magnificent creations were stained in unspeakable acts during the war. His reticence and perhaps obliviou-sness regarding his legacy provides the film’s most disquieting comment on the transience of history and memory.