Watches
August 30, 2020
Yamazaki's latest is quite the surprise. He leaves behind the big budget fantasy worlds and focuses a on a bit of Japanese War history. Don't expect a typical war film though, while there two or three action scenes, this film is really about math, budgets and political meetings. Not the most glamorous subjects.
The film revolves around the production of a new battle ship. In order to get it made, a budget has to be approved, but the opponents suspect that the proposed budget is an incredible underestimation. They hire a young but skilled mathematician to help them figure out the actual cost of the ship, but he has no idea about ships, nor politics.
It's a small miracle that Yamazaki actually manages a couple of tense scenes, because the subject matter is just incredibly dry. The film relies quite heavily on dialogues and the important meeting where everything is decided spans almost half the film. It's hardly Yamazaki's best film and I doubt there's a big market for this, but considering the circumstances, he still did a pretty decent job.