Search - Men Behind The Sun on DVD

Reprehensible in both content and presentation

D. Gerstle | New York | 07/07/2009

(1 out of 5 stars)

"The 20th century saw nearly global experimentation upon human bodies through thousands of experiments aiming to maximize military/civilian casualties and (more horrifyingly) build upon scientific knowledge of human biology. This is true of Nazi Germany, Imperial Japan, the US, Britain, Argentina, Iraq, and a host of other nations. It is a truly grizzly political - historical path that humanity walked, but it is necessary that we look closely at its nuances to understand the current state of military/scientific knowledge and ethics.

All this said, I regret ever having laid eyes on this movie. Particular memories of it still make me nauseous to this day. While one might argue that 'That's the point... to shock you with historical facts!' But this in no way justifies the gratuity of violence in this film or - more pressingly - the fact that it is a POORLY COMPOSED STORY. The dialogue alone is ridiculous, as are the cookie-cutter personalities of all characters, who are neatly divided into perpetrators (sadistic, nearly-insane, supervillians who roar with laughter at their own devilish ideas) and victims (who somehow recognize the historical enormity of their situation and discuss it in the most unconvincing ways imaginable). However, mostly this movie just presents pornographic measures of graphic torture (people skinned alive, vivisections, exposure to extreme temperatures and pressure). Certainly these things HAPPENED, but their representation in film - at it stands with this monstrosity - only serves to further insult the memories of those who suffered."

I am rating this on a shock factor....

Alexander Stephen Brown | Vicksburg, ms United States | 07/31/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Although there isn't much I haven't seen by watching Cannibal Holocaust, Faces of Death, or Salo, I ran across this film on youtube, the full length feature. Although what I saw was not in english and there were no subtitles, I got the point of the film just the same. Never before have I felt so sickened over one scene then in this movie. There is a scene where a mother and child are taken into the cold. The child which is only an infant is thrown into the ice then stomped to death. The mother which is being held down has pots of ice cold water poured onto her hands and arms, and they let it freeze. After I'm assuming a few hours the ice is knocked away from her hands and arms, which are now black due to frost bite. They bring her inside and instruct her to stick her hands into a bowling pot of water, which she does, but it doesn't phase her because she can't feel anything any longer. After a few minutes she takes her hands/arms out of the water and a scientist cuts the skin around her elbows then rips the skin and meat away leaving noting but bone as the woman is left screaming with strands of skin and meat hanging from her fingers. This scene my dear friends repulsed me more so then the cat being thrown to the pit of rats."

Propaganda is propaganda, exploitation is exploitation

Anthony Hand | Dublin, Ireland | 10/26/2009

(2 out of 5 stars)

"Made with the approval of the Chinese Central Committee, Mou Tun Fei's 1988...er..."classic" is really nothing more than a Chinese propaganda/exploitation flick dressed up as an historical document on Japanese atrocities carried out at the Unit 731 experimental warfare research facility in the Chinese puppet state of Manchuko during WWII.

However, there absolutely nothing on offer here that is of factual substance, other than the fact that Unit 731 existed and was concerned with finding a viable way to use bacterial/chemical warfare as a means to pursue a Japanese victory in the Second World War.

As much of the first hand documentary evidence has long since disappeared, it therefore stands to reason that what really happened at Unit 731 will always remain a matter of conjecture. That it was a place of experimentation and atrocity, is something few will disagree with, but the actual facts of Unit 731 will be found in the written word, not in this film and as such people interested in further understanding the facility and the people who were there will have to seek out the few books on the subject that exist.

Mou's film has enjoyed a lot of respect in some quarters and it's truly incredible that quite a few people really think that they are watching some sort of factual account, even though the frankly absurd torture on screen is evidence of a horror/exploitation angle rather than a historical document. The utter pointlessness of the "experiments" presented should have been a clue to everyone that what they were looking at was more akin to `Ilsa: She Wolf of the SS' or `Love Camp 7', than to something of more historical worth. The notorious frostbite experiments are indicative of this. In that scene a woman is left in the extreme cold so her arms become badly frostbitten and then she is brought inside the facility and told to dip her arms in heated water. When she withdraws them, the "Japanese" researcher then strips the flesh from her bones leaving her with two skeletal arms. This famous and shocking scene is great for exploitation cinema lovers (of which I am one), but is absolutely useless as a document on real frostbite tests. This "experiment" in `Man Behind the Sun' would serve absolutely no scientific purpose whatsoever. Another frostbite test has a man's arms frozen and then his fingers are smashed with a hammer, again in an utterly pointless (but highly shocking) "experiment" scene. Other pointlessness includes a live vivisection on a young boy and throwing a cat to starving rats. The former has been touted by the director as a real vivisection (which clearly it's not & I believe Mou has dropped that particular hype) and the latter has been said to have been a real cat attacked and eaten by real rats. While the animals are real, there has been some dispute to whether the scene has been faked. Either way, it actually remains the most disturbing scene in the movie. But again, while this serves the purpose of a horror/gore movie, it does nothing else. In fact, such silliness subtracts from the film's supposed stated goal, a document on Unit 731.

By the way, the rats themselves were later really set on fire for one of the movies final scenes in a truly appalling and un-necessarily cruel stunt.

The opening tag line of the film. "Friendship is friendship. History is history." suggests a more serious execution of a serious matter. But, the end product fails miserably in that respect. Even the actual nature of the film (exploitation cinema) fails ultimately, because the film is just not gritty or gory enough. There are also long, long periods of boredom sprinkled throughout and the characters never once match up to real people. The overdubbed (Asian) soundtrack is bothersome as well, mainly due to its cheap nature and the print quality is rubbish.

`Man Behind the Sun' certainly is an interesting film in parts, but not for the reasons espoused by its makers. It does have some inventive atrocity (for those who wish to seek out such material) and well done special effects. But, as a factual document, it's worthless.
"

Yee Gads!

Carl Heiden | Portland oregon usa | 11/29/2007

(4 out of 5 stars)

"O.k. finally pulled the trigger and bought this one. Curiosity got the best of me. Love war movies and history, and am a self confessed gore hound. However a softy at heart. With the Philosophy that a movie and reality is a completely different deal, at least in my mind. I don't like violence for violence sake per se. If you saw my DvD collection you would maybe consider me hypocritical. I saw the dubbed version, saw later it was offered in Chinese (Cantonese, Manderian). The English version gave it a Jerry Lewis hilarity that later becomes very ironic. An important Movie that i'm glad someone had the freedom to make. But a couple scenes are profoundly disturbing. It's not just the gore, altough there is that. Most of the gore is very digestible if not primitive, however when the context is provided it is really hard to watch. Maybe because we actually care about a character or two and I give the director credit for that. I should tell the potential buyers that there is retribution for some of the crimes which possibly makes us feel a little better about what we just saw. I did some soul searching after the one viewing and asked myself why I bought this film, and what makes me motivated to see this particular carnage. I gave it a high rating because I suppose I got my moneys worth."