The director Kaneto Shindo wants to pay tribute to the "simple people." The Naked Island is about a family struggling to survive by growing crops on an island off of the coast of Japan. To water these crops the viewer gets to watch a lot of scenes of the mother and father traveling by boat to the mainland to fetch water in buckets. Essentially the first 30 minutes of the film are scenes of two people carrying water buckets up the hill and down the hill up the hill and down the hill up the hill and down the hill.
The black and white photography in this film is quite stunning to look at, the island may not have any water but it is very photogenic. The film contains no dialog so there are none of those pesky subtitles to read.
I don't doubt the sincerity of this film for one minute I just question the concept of it. It seems that if you are going to spend your life working like a dog you might want to farm on a piece of land that maybe has a well on in. Why deliberately attempt to survive in such a hostile environment?
This film has been lauded as a masterpiece by many critics, it's always easier to watch people suffering in the comfort of a movie theater where you get free refills of popcorn and soda when you super size.
96 minutes
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