Philosophy of a Knife

I'm rarely moved to comment on movies and books because others have generally already expressed everything I have to say. No need to repeat.

However, this movie is so appallingly bad that it deserves every terrible review we can collectively muster.

As a documentary, it fails. Too many inaccuracies, too much left out, too many things left unexplained. The man whose interview answers are interspersed throughout was not directly involved in any of it and had nothing new to contribute. The narration, delivered in all its monotone glory, is insipid and adds no insight. Of course, despite purporting to convey a true story, it's not billed as a documentary so I suppose you could forgive the faults. But seriously, this is laughably inaccurate.

As a horror film, it fails. Mostly because it's too long by at least 2 hours, has no momentum and is, frankly, boring. Yes, the experimentation scenes are graphic. But there are only a handful of them – maybe one every 20 minutes? - so this can't even qualify as a gore fest. Besides, the effects are amateurish at best, and no self-respecting horror fan would be impressed. The infamous tooth-pulling scene is shockingly fake. There are numerous lengthy scenes of prisoners sitting around waiting – is Iskanov trying to create suspense? I have this bad habit of doggedly finishing a book or a movie I really don't like or actively loathe, just because I hate leaving something unfinished. I don't usually regret this because it's a conscious decision and I feel I have a better idea of the work as a whole if I actually finish watching or reading it. I regret wasting my time with this movie.

It was some of the most self-indulgent dreck I've ever come across. Iskanov's repetitive use of silent snow-falling-on-gray-building scenes were maddening. I started timing them, and they ranged from about 2 to 6 minutes, making them ideal for bathroom breaks, walking the dog or fixing a sandwich. If you wanted to skip over the Russian guy's interview scenes too, you'd have enough time for a solid power nap.

Actually, don't bother with it at all. Then you don't have to mess with fast forwarding and all that.

I love Andrey Iskanov's other works such as Nails and Visions of Suffering and find Philosophy of a Knife along the same lines. While yes this movie is disturbing, graphic and based on real events I am amazed at the backlash the movie and Andrey have gotten.

Unlike other reviewers I knew what this movie was about going in. Yes there was a documentary aspect to it, part documentary and some historical footage which I thought helped connect the film as a whole, ramming it home even more that this was based on a true story. I am not sure what kind of movie others were expecting. Maybe they did not listen to the beginning interview or have not heard about Unit 731 before, or even seen Andrey's other works. I find the attack on actors and special effects ludicrous. How do you expect people to act in this scenario? Most of the special effects were very good in my opinion. There were some that could have been done better but that is the way it is and to me has no relevance to the movie as a whole. This movie was made in a certain style and is not your Hollywood pumped out generic horror crap or cookie cutter work. One reviewer even said it was a horrible movie because the actress had a Brazilian which apparently the character would not have at the time. Out of everything that is going on in that movie, the pain, cruelty, and deadening of humanity he focuses on that... I would go ahead and watch and listen to the quick interview at the beginning of the movie which answers all the questions other posters are missing. Yes it's not for everyone and for me its even hard to say I enjoyed it because it was very disturbing. My rant is over...

The small portions of this movie that have any merit, mostly the archival footage which is in some cases quite well applied, are over shadowed by a number of glaring flaws. The narrator blatantly overlooks other widespread abuses and atrocities committed by the whole of the Japanese military, instead claiming that any injustices were simply in response to pressures from the conflict with Russia. To try and whitewash Unit 731's role as a defencive measure is historically inaccurate, and since the Philosophy of a Knife claims to be a sober look at historical events, it fails on that level. I would say while there are few other movies that focus primarily on Imperial Japan's forays into chemical and biological warfare, this one does not ear points for filling a niche void.

This epic is 4 hours long. Much of that 4 hours is the exterior of a building which may or may not be the one in question.

In a prologue the director and I think one of the producers tell us, among other things, that they "did not research" a lot of the facts.

But they say their work is based on facts and that the movie is supposed to be about death and war....

There is a fair amount of interesting stuff in the movie, enough for maybe 90 minutes. But not 4 hours. I think they wanted to give the viewer some sense of ennui by showing the building the falling snow from this angle, from that angle, from another angle...all with no narration over and over. It seemed like about 2 minutes of story and 5 minutes of exterior of building in the falling snow for 4 hours.

I may be exaggerating, but not much. As for the story....

Those who know about Unit 731 may be offended by this film as an effort to cash in on a grisly reputation. Others may be offended by it's portrayal of one American and several Russians as the victims of Unit 731. I am pretty sure the majority of victims were a very diverse group consisting of P.O.W.s from all who fought against Japan, Chinese locals and even Japanese criminals. Pregnant women as well as children were also prey to the heinous Japanese "doctors" of Unit 731.

Regardless, the whole thing to me comes off as lame bondage/torture-porn. That you MIGHT get some idea of a story out of if you take notes when they are actually speaking. Even if you are looking for Bondage/toture-porn keep the remote handy, you have a lot of the building in the falling snow from this angle, from that angle, from another angle...all with no narration over and over to fast forward through.

This movie is four hours long for one reason: director Andrey Iskanov wanted it to be. Lacking enough actual subject matter to warrant a four hour running time, he compensates by having virtually every scene go on for at least twice as long as necessary and inserting numerous shots of snow falling, each of which goes on for several minutes. I would say there's close to a half hour of footage of snow in this movie.

We get surgeons meticulously putting on rubber gloves, prisoners being led down hallways, soldiers trudging through snow, bodies being chopped up, flesh being scraped off a skull, and countless other such sequences all in glorious real time. If tedium and banality are what Iskanov was going for he succeeded admirably.

PHILOSOPHY OF A KNIFE is so devoid of any redeeming quality in its current state it barely even warrants discussion. One of the few positive things I can say about it is that I can see a riveting avant-garde horror movie hidden beneath all the baggage. Had he cut out 2/3 of the running time and tightened up all of his individual scenes, this could have been one of the most effective exercises in Hell-On-Earth sensory overload.

Of course, in an introduction which brings new meaning to the word "pontification," Iskanov informs us that this is not a horror movie, though he expects us unsophisticated westerners to think it is. So maybe I'm even wrong about that. Maybe there's NOTHING good to say about this movie.

Watching this movie has forced me to re-assess my opinion of MEN BEHIND THE SUN, which I thought was little more than an exploitive freak show as well. However, in MEN BEHIND THE SUN director T.F. Mou presented the atrocities in a brutally matter-of-fact manner and allowed us to sympathize somewhat with the prisoners. Now I'm thinking that Mou's film is at least somewhat earnest in its depictions of the horrors of Unit 731.

In PHILOSOPHY, Iskanov re-creates the experiments as highly stylized set-pieces that look more like a Nine Inch Nails music video than an attempt to hit home the true horror of these activities. All (and I mean ALL) the prisoners who are tortured are young, good-looking Russian kids with no backstory whatsoever. I wonder how many female prisoners-of-war during World War II had perfect breasts and shaved pubic hair. And while MEN BEHIND THE SUN acknowledged that Russian, European and American prisoners did fall victim to Unit 731, PHILOSOPHY completely ignores the fact that the vast majority of victims were Chinese.

And if what you want is nothing more than blood and guts, even that fails to live up to the hype. The effects (which Iskanov did himself) are amateurish and sloppy. Only a sequence in which a woman's teeth are pulled is even somewhat effective, not because it's well-done, but because pretty much everyone can imagine how much that would hurt. OLDBOY's teeth pulling scene is far more chilling and horrific than this.

This long, boring, dishonest, self-indulgent movie is a major waste of time. I want my four plus hours back.