City of Life and Death (2009)

In the winter 1937-8 the city of Nanjing was besieged by Japan. City of Life and Death (dir. Lu Chuan) delves into the horror of the occupation but it also tells many striking stories about human relations. Filmed in crisp b&w, the film has a feel of raw and relentless realism. It draws our attention to systematic killing and raping but it never feels exploitative in doing so. A wide-scale massacre is executed and a German manages to create a safety zone that saves many Chines soldiers and civilians. For all its brave descriptions of war-time atrocities, City of Life and Death sometimes falls into the trap of sentimentality. It tries to look for love in prostitution and heroes in the rank of ordinary men. I have difficulties articulating what my problem with the film was. It was a shattering experience to watch the close-ups of faces expressing deep fear and agony and in the same way the film takes the viewer to unspeakable places of violence and humiliation. We are taken directly to the horrific events of the siege, without the safety net of a historical context. In all this, I cannot repress the feeling that the film imposes a rather rigid storytelling. By overwhelming me, exhausting me, flooding me with images of cruelty versus bravery, it sets out to tell the truth.

Perhaps a further problem is the dichotomy the film risks evoking: the mass against the heroic individual. On the other hand, the film looks at kindness where we least would expect it. Yes, there is the teacher who provides spots of safety but there is also the German Nazi, Rabe who saves people from a violent death. When I started watching this film I feared that the Japanes soldiers would be treated like monsters. They aren't. The soldiers are a motley crew and Lu Chuan shows the multitude of reaction to the horror expressed by the soldiers: there is shock but also jaded responses. Even though I found some things problematic, City of Life and Death is an important film and it is an example of a war movie that never deals in propaganda. This is something to marvel at, given that the Nanjing siege has remained political dynamite. However, as I said, there is a tension, an ambiguity at play. Even though there is no outrageous propagandistic elements here, the way of telling the story, the appearance of relentless realism, does something with how I relate to the images. There is something strange in the conviction the film tries hard to induce in me. Conviction of what?