The Human Condition I: No Greater Love (Ningen no joken)

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The first part of The Human Condition follows Nakadai Tatsuya as Kaji, a pacifist technocrat who naively signs a devil’s contract by accepting an unlikely post as supervisor of forced laborers in a remote Manchukuo mine in exchange for promised exception from military conscription. Newly-wed, Kaji is accompanied by his devoted bride—played with ardent intensity by the radiant Aratama Michiyo—who valiantly endures the harsh desolation and bitter frustration her husband can barely contain. Nakadai’s struggle to improve the plight of the Chinese POW laborers while appeasing the disdainful military authorities and protecting his marriage, is just the first of the Herculean tasks that await. No Greater Love makes stunning use of widescreen cinematography to transform the bleak landscapes into a stark, otherworldly expression of the vast, pitiless void that threatens to erode the couple’s fervent love and convictions.

The Shochiku Centennial Collection at the Harvard Film Archive presents: THE HUMAN CONDITION, directed by Kobayashi Masaki (screened in three parts), co-presented with the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies