Product: Snow Falling on Cedars (2000)
Rating: 5.0
A movie in love with existence
Do you know how you come across those people who are so graceful, so exuberant, & so amzing that they make most people seem like zombies? Well that's what this movie does to other films. This is a film desperately in love with being alive. Every camera shot, every sound effect, every close-up seems to give the viewer a new perspective, a new take on life. For me it's one of those life-changing things.The story is somewhat heavy-handed in parts: the director never really gives you a realistic Japanese perspective on the horror of being ripped from their homes & being sent to relocation camps (and, frankly, given that 40 million people died in WWII & tens of millions more lost everything they owned, it seems almost miniscule). And while the prosecution's closing argument basically amounts to 'convict him because he's Japanese', the defense's closing argument seems equally inept: 'acquit him because he's Japanese.'But these are minor issues indeed. The story moves past these quickly and makes a far better argument against prejudice in the protagonist's personal story. And IT IS an amazing story.