Gekkō no Natsu (Summer of the Moonlight Sonata)
Directed
by Seijirō Kōyama
Written by Tsuneyuki Mori
Pony Canyon, 1993, 111 min., Video
This touching movie about two kamikaze pilots who love
playing the piano became a big hit when released in 1993. Over 2.1 million
people saw the film within two years of its release, and it was shown in over
2,000 locations in Japan. Gekkō no Natsu (Summer of the Moonlight
Sonata) has strongly influenced Japanese people's perception of kamikaze pilots
as cultured and sensitive young men. This movie's great popularity led to
creation of a documentary
novel, children's
book, and drama CD on the same
subject.
Tsuneyuki Mori, who has written several other
documentaries, plays, and novels about issues related to the war and postwar
period, wrote the novel Gekkō no Natsu in 1991. He also wrote the
script for the movie, which received financial support for its production from
Tosu City in Saga Prefecture, the Chiran Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots, and
many other individuals and organizations.
Although the movie is fictional, it is based on the true
story of two kamikaze pilots who one day in May 1945 visited Tosu Elementary
School, located several miles from Metabaru Army Air Base where they were
stationed. They wanted to play music one final time on the grand piano located
at the school. Utako Ueno, the young teacher in charge of the piano, listened to
one of the pilots play Beethoven's Sonata No. 14, popularly known as the
Moonlight Sonata. In 1989, the school wanted to get rid of the old piano no
longer in use, but Ueno gave a talk at a school assembly to tell her story about
the two kamikaze pilots who visited the school before their final mission in order to play
the piano. The local media covered the assembly, and many residents expressed
their support to have the piano restored.
Two extended flashbacks, one near the beginning of the film
and one near the end, cover the experiences of the two kamikaze pilots in June
1945. The movie starts with the talk by Kimiko Yoshida (Utako Ueno in real
story) to the assembly at Tosu
Elementary School, and the film then shows the 1945 visit by the two pilots to
Tosu as Yoshida tells the story to present-day schoolchildren. After one
pilot plays Moonlight Sonata, the other pilot plays the war song "Umi
Yukaba" ("If We Go to Sea") as the students gather around
the piano to sing. Yoshida gives the two pilots some white lilies as they leave
the school to return to base. After the end of the war, Kimiko waits for
the pilots to return to play the piano again, but they never do.
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Kimiko listens to
pilot play piano at
Tosu Elementary School
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After Yoshida's talk to the Tosu children, several
reporters ask her questions including one about the identity of the pilots. She
explains that she never asked their names, so she does not know. Rie Ishida, a
local reporter who attended the school assembly, calls Yasufumi Miike, a
Tokyo-based documentary producer, to ask him to visit Saga Prefecture to consider making a
documentary on this story. Miike and Ishida first find out some information
about the Army's special attack operations from a former kamikaze pilot living
in Saga Prefecture.
One of the two pilots told Yoshida during the 1945 visit
that he had attended Kumamoto Teachers College with the dream of becoming a
music teacher. Based on this information, a reporter calls Shinsuke Kazama, a
man living in Kumamoto Prefecture who had attended the same college. Kazama says
he does not remember anything and hangs up on the reporter. Ishida and Miike
decide to visit Kazama's home, but he tells them to leave without telling them anything. However, Kazama calls Miike in Tokyo a short time later and asks him
to come again to his home. When Miike visits this time, Kazama explains that he
was one of the pilots who visited Tosu Elementary School and that his wife is
the younger sister of the other pilot, Mitsuhiko Unno.
The second extended flashback in the film tells what
happened to Kazama and Unno after leaving Tosu. They went the next day to Chiran
Air Base, where they soon had to go on a suicide attack mission. On the way to
make an attack on Allied ships off Okinawa, Kazama's plane developed engine
trouble, so his squad commander ordered him to return. After his return to
Chiran, he was ordered to a Fukuoka Prefecture Army facility called the Shinbu
Barracks, where he was confined with other kamikaze pilots who had returned from
missions.
After telling Miike about his wartime experiences, Kazama
says he will go to Tosu to meet Yoshioka. He enters the gymnasium filled with
people and sees the same grand piano that he and Unno played several decades before.
He warmly greets Yoshioka and sits down to play the first movement from Moonlight
Sonata. As he plays, a final brief flashback shows Unno and the rest of the
pilots in his squadron being shot down before they reach their targets.
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Kazama plays Moonlight Sonata at end of film
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Kazama embodies the distress and shame felt by many
kamikaze pilots who survived when their comrades perished in attacks. Many
Japanese gained an understanding of the complex emotions felt by surviving
pilots for the first time when they viewed this film. Kazama shows in his eyes
and expression the great sorrow felt for many years, not only from the death of
his comrades but also from the terrible treatment he received in Shinbu
Barracks after he returned from his kamikaze mission.
The film's plot basically follows Mori's novel, but the
movie and book have many small differences. For example, when Yoshida visits the
Chiran Peace Museum in Kagoshima Prefecture, in the movie she recognizes the
face of Mitsuhiko Unno, the pilot who played the Moonlight Sonata, among the
more than 1,000 photos of kamikaze pilots displayed at the museum. However, in the book
the reader does not know about Unno until Shinsuke Kazama reveals his identity.
The film also leaves out most of the historical background information regarding special attack forces that made suicide attacks near the end of
the war.
Japan's Ministry of Education, National Congress of Parents
& Teachers, Japan Film Society, and other groups recommended this film. The
Chiran Peace Museum for Kamikaze Pilots displayed Tosu Elementary School's grand
piano from 1993 to 1995, and now the Tosu Board of Education displays the piano
in an assembly hall to allow the public to view it.
Gekkō no Natsu connects several images to
kamikaze pilots to show their innocence, purity, and culture. Kazama and Unno
depart Tosu Elementary School carrying white lilies. On the night before their
departure to Okinawa, one pilot in their squadron plays with a puppy and another
pilot has two small mascot dolls next to him. In the moonlight the squadron
sings together a German folk song on the eve of their
departure. Kazama and Unno both loved piano music rather than fighting, an image
in stark contrast to the typical Western view of kamikaze pilots as fanatical
warriors.
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