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2 Movies and Asia-Pacific War
The films The 400 Million and the devil on the doorstep describe the Asia-Pacific war differently. On one side, the film The 400 Million presents Chinese engagement in armed conflict in 1938 as the country resists the Japanese invasion. The film shows the Japanese invasion that starts with the bombing of China in the North East (The 400 Million, 1939). This shows an act that China expresses as an aggression that was not provoked. The stranger refers himself as ”me” in a way to create anonymity (The 400 Million, 1939). On the other hand, the film, devil on the doorstep shows the invasion of the Japanese army in a rural place, where they take people hostage (Devils on the Doorstep 2000). The method of aggression is shown differently, but represent the impact of the war on china.
The two films, however, present china as the victim of armed conflicts involving the country. The film The 400 Million shows Japan as the aggressor and china as the victim that is defending the invasion. The film devil on the doorstep presents the ideology that the Chinese literature represents. It shows how the literature shows that China is the passive victim of war. This is because the plot and the events of the film present the Chinese as the victims who tend to blame the aggressor. This is even seen in the title that suggests the devil is on the doorstep.
While the two films take on the Japanese invasion from different perspectives and plots, they all agree with the presentation of china as the aggressor. In both plots, china is presented as the innocent victim that is attacked by Japan. This is particularly important when evaluating how the films present the conflict. While the plots represent a real military conflict objectively, the indication of china as the victim shows the inclination of the films.
References
Devils on the Doorstep, Jiang Wen, Dong Ping, Yang Hongguang, Liu Xiaodian, Liu Xiaodong, Fortissimo Films, United States, DVD, 2000
The 400 Million, Joris Ivens, 1939, USA, DVD