광신과 애국 사이: 전후 일본 영화에 비춰진 특공의 표상

Abstract

This study reviews how ‘Kamikaze special attack’ repeatedly recalled even today andconsumed in post-war Japanese society has been represented and remembered sequentiallythrough the films related to Kamikaze special attack which were made in post-war Japan.Thus, this review is to explore the politics of discours on the representation of ‘Kamikazespecial attack’ and also to read the structure of feelings of that times related to the memoryof the war. During the war, Kamikaze special attack had been glorified as ‘a deified war hero’, butafter the defeat, its status degraded and disappeared from the stage of official discourse.And then, it appeared again onto the official stage along with a boom in publishingposthumous writings in 1950’s and especially quite a few films dealing with Kamikaze specialattack were made in 1960’s-1970’s, which allowed Kamikaze special attack as a significanticon in the memory of the past war. The controversy surrounding the representation ofKamikaze special attack that time was developed to the issue on whether their death was‘patriotic martyrdom’ or ‘useless death’. Theory of patriotic martyrdom emphasized theirdedicated death for the Japanese emperor and to save the country at a crisis, while theoryof ‘useless death’ emphasized strategical and historical uselessness of Kamikaze special attack. Although both of the arguments implied the critical view for the military authorities orgovernment that invented such an inhuman strategy, they could not get out of theirconventional frame of the meaning like ‘patriotic martyrdom=dedicated sacrifice’ and ‘uselessdeath=purposeless death’, and finally ended in regeneration of the aesthetics of death shownin Japanese romantism that prevailed during the war Since the middle of 1990’s, some changes have appeared in the representation of thecommandos. That is, existing image of them as manly adults disappeared and showed pureyoung guys instead, with an ethnically different Korean commando. This change attractsattention in that it was made in the process that the history of war experience was aboutto be converted into memory/commemoration, after being weathered over 50 years fromthe war. It seemingly implies a logical conclusion that the emphasis of the youth and puritydestroyed by cruel reality like war accused the brutality of militarism. But, critical understanding of such reality was often diluted by nostalgic romanticism shown in the filmsdealing with Kamikaze special attack in the period. The biggest problem of such romanticismor sentimentalism has is to solve a problem based on sympathy, the emotion imagined asthey share collectively, without any change in subjective way of individual existence orrelated social formation. What needs in order to get out of the ‘soft nationalism’ behind modern Japanese societybased on romanticism is objective understanding of existence of death and logical thoughtthat can question the responsibility for causing the death. It is why, today, we should re‒question the representation of Kamikaze special attack decorated with aesthetic patriotismflowing in romantic aesthetics of death.