The Shiranui Sea

The Shiranui Sea (不知火海, Shiranuikai) is a Japanese documentary made in 1975 by Noriaki Tsuchimoto. It is the fourth in a series of independent documentaries that Tsuchimoto made of the mercury poisoning incident in Minamata, Japan.

The Shiranui Sea
Directed byNoriaki Tsuchimoto
Produced byRyūtarō Takagi
CinematographyKōshirō Ōtsu
Edited by
  • Noriaki Tsuchimoto
  • Keiko Ichihara
Production
company
Seirinsha Productions
Release date
  • 1975 (1975)
Running time
153 min
CountryJapan
LanguageJapanese

Film content

Four years after Minamata: The Victims and Their World, Tsuchimoto's camera focuses on the everyday lives of the victims of mercury poisoning. Fisherman still knowingly catch and eat the mercury-laden fish caught in the beautiful Shiranui Sea because that is what they have always done and that is how they relate to nature. Some patients who received significant compensation from Chisso, the polluter, may now live in good houses, but without doing work their lives seem somehow empty. The real victims remain the children, who are now getting older and in some cases increasingly conscious of the fact they are different from other children.

Reception

The film scholar Justin Jesty wrote that The Shiranui Sea is "the crowning achievement of Tsuchimoto's first five years of engagement with mercury poisoning. The film is a long and powerful meditation on the depth and breadth of the tragedy."[1] The documentarist Makoto Satō called The Shiranui Sea "the ultimate masterpiece" of Tsuchimoto's Minamata films;[2] and the filmmaker John Gianvito selected it as one of the ten best films of all time in the 2012 Sight and Sound poll.[3]

References
  1. Justin, Jesty (2011). "Making Mercury Visible: The Minamata Documentaries of Tsuchimoto Noriaki". In Sharon L. Zuber, Michael C. Newman (ed.). Mercury Pollution: A Transdisciplinary Treatment. CRC Press. p. 153. ISBN 9781439833841.
  2. Satō, Makoto. 講演「特集 小川紳介と土本典昭」 (in Japanese). Athenee Francais Culture Center. Retrieved 22 November 2013.
  3. Davidson, David (8 April 2013). "The Films of John Gianvito". Toronto Film Review. Retrieved 22 November 2013.
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