Roman Polanski and Kinji Fukasaku

     A movie �gBatoru Rowaiaru�h became the talk of Japan in 2000. Its content was extremely shocking.
According to the fictional BR (Battle Royal) law called �gShinseiki-Kyoiku-Kaikaku-Ho,�h one third-year
students�f class in Japan is selected by lottery every year and they are sent to isolated places like an
uninhabited island. Weapons, maps, food and so on are given to them there, and they continue to kill each
other until someone among them becomes the last survivor. Only a winner will be given a right to live on.
The contents of the movie were so violent and shocking to adults as well as young people that a member
of an assembly had taken it up for discussion.
     Kinji Fukasaku, the director of the movie, constantly affirmed his movie and its contents although there
were arguments for and against it. His remarks on TV news have crossed the writer�fs mind. He said
something like the following; those who do not see good movies cannot understand my movies. Although
the writer did not see movies so often, he was not able to agree with his opinion. He thought that there
must be some better movies than �gBatoru Rowaiaru,�h and he happened to come across the very movie
that he had wanted to see. Its title is �gThe Pianist,�h which is now showing in Japan. Its outline is the
following; a radio station where Wladyslaw Szpilman was playing the piano was attacked from the air by
German forces in 1939. After that, the members of his family except Wladyslaw were sent to a
concentration house and all of them died. Wladyslaw, who was helped by his friend, worked in a ghetto,
but he managed to escape from it looking to his friend Janina for help in 1943. She gave shelter to him in
an apartment. After that, his friend Dorota harbored him with her husband. However, the Nazis captured
Janina and Dorota moved to her parents�f house, so he ran away alone in a battlefield in Warsaw.
However, a German captain, whose name was Wilm Hosenfeld, found him. Fortunately, the captain helped
many Jews, so Wladyslaw had a narrow escape from death. The real Wladyslaw Szpilman died at the age
of 88 on July 6, 2000.
     Roman Polanski, the director of �gThe Pianist�h had similar personal experiences to Wladyslaw�fs. He
was born in France in 1933 and moved to Poland, his mother�fs country, when he was three years old.
When the Nazis persecuted his family, his parents were sent to a concentration camp and his mother died
in 1941. Polanski escaped from the ghetto and survived thanks to a Catholic�fs help. It is certain that
Polanski�fs personal experiences make Wladyslaws�f movie still more realistic.
     Fukasaku was born in 1930, Polanski in !933. They lived in the same age. One was born in Mito, Japan.
The other in Paris. Why are their movies and their viewpoints of the movies different from each other?
Fukasaku produced a movie that killed human beings intentionally, but Polanski described the misery of
killing human beings inevitable in a war. Although Fukasaku made murder games in his movie, Planski
makes slaughter a message of peace. Polanski shows that there are good people among the Nazis, and
that there are bad people among Jews. Why are Polanski and Fukasaku so different?   

Notes: �gBatoru Rowaiaru�h is the Japanese title of Fukasaku�fs movie. Its English name is not clear
because it is spelled �gBattle Royal�h or �gBattle Royale.�h Also, �gBattle Royal�h does not seem to make
sense. Judging from the story of the movie, is �gBattle Loyal�h right?