Movie Review: Midnight Eagle

Approaching the scope that is usually reserved for big budget Hollywood pictures, Japanese director Izuru Narushima's new film Midnight Eagle tells an epic story, without falling victim to the Hollywood conventions.

When former wartime journalist Yuji Nishizaki catches a photograph of an American Stealth Bomber crashing into the Northern Japanese Alps, he and a fellow civilian journalist are thrust into the middle of a covert operation that has been sent to disarm a nuclear warhead that threatens to thrust Japan into unprecedented turmoil.

Complete with Special Forces units, North Korean secret agents and governmental snafus, Midnight Eagle is as poignant as it is intense. Collaborating for the first time in the history of Japanese film, the Ministry of Defense, the Ground Self Defense Forces and the Japan Air Self-Defense helped lend authenticity to this story of intertwining narratives.

Reminiscent of testosterone driven actioners like Cliffhanger and Top Gun, many sequences of the military in motion should get audiences' pulses pounding with its sleek visuals and synthesized soundtrack, but Narushima never gets too caught up in all the big budget glitz. While some might scoff that a few civilians have become so entrenched in a military crisis, let's not forget that this is the general rule of thumb for most American crises movies.

Narushima doesn't forget this fact either, and he infuses what could have easily been a trite and tidy Hollywood narrative with some Japanese flair. Narushima uses the genre conventions to help build suspense. Tried and true cinematic techniques, such as Hitchcock's "ticking clock", are masterfully applied. However before audiences become too comfortable with the direction the film is going, Narushima pulls the rug out from under viewers, hitting them with a strong message about the preparation of the Japanese Military.

Performances and production values in Midnight Eagle are equally stellar. Narushima makes use of every penny, capturing everything from the subtle beauty of the actors' performances, to the stunning vistas of the Northern Alps.

The fate of the nation rests in the hands of a few, mostly due to oversights from government and military officials. Narushima makes sure to hammer this point home. With countries surrounding Japan threatening to take up nuclear arms, Midnight Eagle could do for Japanese audiences what Fail-Safe did for Americans in the sixties. Rather than sending global audiences home cheering, the sacrifice displayed in the heartbreaking conclusion of Midnight Eagle should leave viewers filled with more questions than satisfaction.

-Joe Russo (www.MoviePulse.net)