Letters From Iwo Jima

This is a movie that depicts the Japanese viewpoint of the battle of Iwo Jima. This has english subtitles but do not let that deter you from seeing a powerful movie. I really enjoyed the fact that it was a black and white film with color intermittantly splashed into the film. Ken Watanabe provides a powerful performance as a Japanese general who has spent time in America before the war. This provides some interesting inner turmoil and also within his ability to lead his troops into battle against the Americans. Now that I just spoke of an individual performance, this movie should be considered a complete movie where no one actor supercedes the grand aspect of the movie as a whole. I did not get overly emotional in this movie but it brought a better apreciation of the Japanese soldier as not the evil enemy but more of a product of the atrocities of war. There are many personalites of people and we all make good and bad choices which are magnified in a war situation but those choices are overshadowed by the very bad aspect of war in general. It sounds simplistic but we all get along much better when we acknowledge and sometimes celebrate our differences yet strive to work together as one human society. I give this a thumbs up shrouded with a combination of the rising sun and stars and stripes as a show of peaceful unity.