Clocking at nearly three hours, director Arthur Harari's strange-but-true feature (a truly international co-production of French, Belgian, Japanese, Italian, Cambodian, and German cinema interests) is adapted from published memoirs of a famous Japanese WWII holdout soldier who remained in the Pacific jungles as an active (if severely marginalized) combatant from 1944 to 1974. One wonders how Werner Herzog, a filmmaker known for extremes of human behavior in exotic settings, didn't tackle this material first.
In the twilight of Imperial Japan, young Hiro Onoda (portrayed by Yuya Endo) is too afraid of heights to be trained as a kamikaze pilot. Instead, he joins a special sector that teaches "secret" warfare (AKA guerilla tactics) and is sent with a squad of other young men to the island of Lubang, in the Philippines, to lurk in the verdure, defend an airfield against approaching Americans and harass native Filipinos sided with the Allies.
Air bombardments, illness/death, and defections whittle the size of the Japanese warriors down to just four, who remain to hear that Japan has lost the war. Yet, so deep is devotion to duty (or, possibly, that they have severed psychological ties to home and cannot face any alternative), that the Japanese continue fighting in the field—though what conceived as mighty counter-strikes against America now are just petty vandalism (setting fire to village crops) and burglaries for food and supplies.
Even when families of the holdout soldiers try to contact them and urge them to disarm, Onoda and his one surviving comrade resist and continue hiding. At one point they confabulate a joint alternative reality that a vast war between a unified Asia and the West rages after all; everything to the contrary they hear on the radio and in print material supplied by visitors is insidious hoax propaganda and coded messages (US viewers should get a sense of similar shared delusion by the Trump holdouts who cannot believe the 2020 election).
A flash-forward at the beginning informs those unfamiliar with the saga that Onoda's lonely vigil will continue right up to the 1970s—still refusing to give up, three decades after Japan's surrender (Kanji Tsuda assumes the role as a stoic, emaciated, and thoroughly unsettling middle-aged soldier).
The narrative evidently needs little embellishing to convey a sense of nationalist loyalty and the military mindset taken to absurd levels; yet, in the unadorned and often sympathetic portrayal, there is still something of honor and nobility in the Japanese stubbornness. Nonetheless, the story makes clear that Onoda and his mates killed innocent Filipinos (in real life, many more than dramatized in the feature). Death and violence here are seldom gory but still disturbing enough.
Onoda's post-holdout life as a Brazilian transplant (the protagonist died in 2014, at 91) goes unexplored, which at least does not add to the epic running time. Japanese holdout-soldiers have become something of a cliche (typically portrayed comedically, as in a "Gilligan's Island" episode) in yesteryear's Hollywood kitsch. This counts as the definitive dramatization of that perennial movie come-on, the `Last Great Untold Story of the Second World War,' and restores humanity to the enemy, in a manner not dissimilar to Clint Eastwood's Letters From Iwo Jima.
Onoda - 10,000 Nights In The Jungle is an extraordinary cinematic achievement that tells a gripping tale of misguided patriotism and resilience in the face of adversity. With unexpected twists and turns, this 165-minute adventure keeps us on the edge of our seats and culminates in a memorably moving denouement that will leave a lasting impact. This film is a testament to the power of storytelling and a must-see for anyone who loves great cinema.
Highly recommended, and a must-have for foreign-language film collections. Its factual basis suggests inclusion also in nonfiction library shelves devoted to Asian studies and Pacific culture and history.