Rotten
The Merry Christmas catalogue of atrocities finally becomes numbing, even ludicrous.
Richard Corliss, TIME Magazine
Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence
Java, 1942 — A clash of cultures, a test of the human spirit.
1983 · 2h 4m · R
Drama, History, War
Directed by
Nagisa Ōshima
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Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence
Overview
Island of Java, 1942, during World War II. British Major Jack Celliers arrives at a Japanese prison camp, run by the strict Captain Yonoi. Colonel John Lawrence, who has a profound knowledge of Japanese culture, and Sergeant Hara, brutal and simpleton, will witness the struggle of wills between two men from very different backgrounds who are tragically destined to clash.
Director and cast
Critics on Rotten Tomatoes
Top critics, in their words
86%
Tomatometer
Fresh
From Oshima's later career... most notable is this bilingual, end-of-WWII tearjerker about forgiveness and understanding between cultures, which could have been dubbed The Man Who Fell to Java.
Aaron Hillis, Village Voice
Rotten
For all the praise heaped upon Oshima's admittedly ambitious film about East-West relations in the microcosm of a Japanese PoW camp during World War II, it's far less satisfactory than most of his earlier work.
Geoff Andrew, Time Out
Rotten
Here's a movie that is even stranger than it was intended to be.
Roger Ebert, Chicago Sun-Times
Fresh
Mr. Oshima has staged the film in a spacious tropical setting and filled it with a great number of extras. Even so, Mr. Bowie always stands out from the crowd.
Janet Maslin, New York Times
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