Sekigahara

It seems that director Masato Harada has emerged as the "Steven Spielberg" of contemporary Japanese cinema-the king of prestige drama. Last year he made another historical drama about WWII, The Emperor in August, while this year he has taken on a major historical production with Sekigahara (2017), the battle that ended the warring Sengoku period. The film is based on Ryotaro Shiba's three volume classic, which involved cutting the main cast of characters from 500 to about 50. The focus of the story is on Mitsunari (Junichi Okada), Ieyasu (Koji Yakusho) and those close to them. A retainer to Hideyoshi Toyotomi (Kenichi Takito), is the lord who first unified the country. Mitsunari is portrayed as a straight-arrow loyalist whose fatal flaw as a general is a  reluctance to adapt to new circumstances. This includes the many side changing antics that take place throughout-I had a hard time figuring out who was on whose side. There are some standout female performances as well. Hatsume (Kasumi Arimura), a bold ninja who catches Mitsunari’s attemtion and Sakon’s wife, Hanano (Noriko Nakagoshi) who shines as an adviser and model character. In contrast, there is Ieyasu, a gifted strategist who is able to find a way to success. It is an ambitious attempt to capture a famous historical event in a dramatic way, however, corners have been cut, so the story may not be as compelling as it could have been and it is overlong at that. However, it is a compelling epic spectacle to look at.