Persona Non Grata: The Chiune Sugihara Story  (杉原千畝)

20 November 2015 (Fri), Tokyo cinema

I coincidentally happened to be reading about Sugihara, the Japanese diplomat in Lithuania who saved thousands of Jewish refugees during the war, so the film caught my eye. Sugihara’s story has been dramatized before, but this was a major Toho release that is obviously being aimed at foreign markets; for one thing, it’s directed by an American, albeit a half-Japanese guy born in Japan, and a good part of it is in English. The clips I’ve seen of previous stagings (Japanese TV drama, Australian play) were long on the melodrama, which the story lends itself to in lesser hands. That made me wary of another version. But a friend was so effusive in her praise that it raised my hopes. Continue reading →