Ke Guo: Thirty Two
At the end of the film photos of old Chinese ladies come up on the screen. They have had the same experience in their lives: They were captured by the Japanese during the war and kept as prisoners in a camp to be abused by the soldiers. They were placed in a so-called ”Comfort Station”.
92 year old Wei Shaolan is one of them and she tells her own story that could quite as well have been one of the others. A clever decision of the filmmakers to concentrate on one – in this case a unique – storyteller. She lives with her son, the consequence of one of numerous rapes, ”a Japanese”, as he has been called many times, 68 years old he is and it seems that he does communicate with his mother. SHE is fabulous. Shocking to listen to her story about the suffering during the time as a prisoner, as well as her hard time back home with the husband, who did not recognise the son of a Japanese soldier. What a life and what a will she has had to survive, and how beautiful a cinematography. That makes her beautiful and where you really are invited to read her old face. Which is like a landscape. Lived Life and a film that is an important historical document that is very well made and respectful towards the woman and all the others, who experienced the horror.
China/ Hong Kong, 2013, 43 mins.
Watched at:
www.americandocumentaryfilmfestival.com
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt3158408/plotsummary?ref_=tt_ov_pl
http://www.thelondonfilmreview.com/film-review/review-thirty-two/
