Nanking

Rating R Formats DVD Genre drama Starring Woody Harrellson, Mariel Hemingway, Stephen Dorff Directed by Dan Sturman, Bill Guttentag Publisher Velocity / Thinkfilm

Nanking is a hard lesson. I warn viewers that this film is unrelenting, and at times overwhelming. Most memorable lessons are, right? This particular story involves the siege of a major city at the end of 1937 and the testimonies and correspondences of those who fought to preserve their culture against tyrannical aggression. It’s one of those spurring documentaries that leaves you breathless, desensitized, and enamored that such events actually unfolded.

Those who are versed in documentary style and structure would have to agree that Guttentag and Sturman’s Nanking is austere yet adamant. There’s nothing blatantly subjective or objective, nothing that gets in the way of telling the facts to an involving, mostly forgotten (or foreign) moment in time. The film is provocative enough using only customary vehicles of historical documentation such as interviews, vintage newsreel footage, and unbiased editing. However, this documentary utilizes a refreshing approach as well; the directors took actual records from those involved during the siege of Nanking and were able to write non-fictional testimonials for professional re-enactment. Once spliced together, the tone and dramatic delivery from seasoned actors like Jurgen Prochnow, Mariel Hemingway, and Woody Harrelson aid in expressing a prominent sympathetical relation to the viewer. Also, by providing multiple points of view the directors are able to move through time at various points of the same event, a storytelling tactic that I believe was successful for this film to further stimulate the audience’s attention. Added with an original score by the Kronos Quartet, you have what I believe to be one of the most harrowing stories that most of us will have the good fortune to never live through but should most definitely be aware of and kept in our memory.

I will not dissuade anyone their thoughts when viewing the stigmatic atrocities which occurred at the city Nanking in 1937, but I do implore that one place themselves within as many political, social, and moralic landscapes of that domineering, war-fueled era. During that time and continuing into the next decade there were such monumental pendulum swings of both devastation and vicissitude that, compelling events and consequential tragedies like the invasion of Nanking are unfortunately often times overlooked. Without the aid of a handful of westerner’s diaries, correspondences, and the accounts of survivors, the story of Nanking may never have reached the public’s eye. After watching Nanking, it should make one shudder as to how many stories such as this have slipped through the cracks.

At the beginning I wrote that Nanking was a lesson. One that varies with each view and viewer… I can only advise that there will be a time during this film when you will feel that he/she can no longer watch due to the emotional pull to one’s heart. So, I leave you with a quote that obligated me to finish this fine film.

“But you who philosophize disgrace and criticize all fears, take the rag away from your face. Now ain’t the time for your tears.” - Bob Dylan