TOKYO
An estimated 3,000 resident Koreans demonstrated in Tokyo April 22 against a proposed education law that would give the Ministry of Education authority to ban "“anti-Japanese thoughts" in foreign schools. The bill would "suppress Korean education, " said a resolution. passed at.a rally attended by the Koreans.
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IS NUCLEAR WAR A FAMILY MATTER?
[The British Broadcasting Corp. recently banned a film because it was "too horrible" to show on the family television screen. The censorship touched off considerable criticism in England. In an . attempt to justify its decision, BBC arranged for a few newspaper editors, war correspondents and members of Parliament to see a special preview of the fifty-minute documentary -- "The War Game" produced by Peter Watkins. Some-of them called it a masterpiece. One. said it was "perhaps the most important film ever made.
_. (The. following is part of a review by Ken Mallett which was published in the April 2 issue of the Toronto Star. J
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Although I was,warned of its brutality, "The War Game" is a shattering experience.
It is deeply moving at a level beyond panic or grief.
It shows us as shattered, mindless, burned-out specimens of a race that was foolish enough to believe it could play "The War Game" and not get hurt. we
It questions the record of the churches, the nuclear theorists and hammers savagely at the ignorance of the public. Watkins' message is simple: It-is insane to possess the Bomb and even more insane to tolerate public ignorance of it.
The film opens by noting how vulnerable Britain is to nuclear attack. _ .
It moves on to a make-believe newscast about Chinese troops entering South Viet Nam and the United States threatening to use atomic weapons unless she withdraws them.
Russia decides to go to China's aid by saying she'll take over West Berlin unless the Americans remove their nuclear weapons.
Finally rioting at Check Point Charlie provokes Russia to move in. :
When NATO troops move through East Germany to relieve the ‘city they are met by overwhelming odds. The use of nuclear weapons is authorized by the Allies. ae oo
As the crisis heightens, the camera. swings back to Kent where man-in-street interviews demonstrate public disbelief that war will come. There is a kind of childish faith that "the authorities" will find a solution. ; , :
And then eb pappeue.:
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A blinding white light-flashes ‘across the landscape and heat as fierce as the sun melts eyeballs and limbs as though they were made of plastic.
A firestorm howls: through towns. The ground gales reach 100 ©» miles an hour and once life-giving oxygen turns to deadly gases. ~ Everything dies, shrivels, melts.
Rescuers and firemen can do nothing. There is a breakdown in civil defence. And then there is no-civil defence at all.
A bewildered, stricken father gazes into the camera. His wife and children have been severely’ irradiated ~- ‘perhaps fatally so. He wonders if -- or when -- they will die. -.
There were scenes that will haunt me for days.
“Scénes like the blinding flash near the enemy weapon's -point of impact; the sight of walls 40 miles distant trembling from: the shock wave; the parade of numbed, expressionless faces.
A doctor sobs, |'some of these people are just falling apart."
A policeman puts: his pistol to’ the heads of the mortally ~ wounded and pulls the trigger.
Said Watkins after he resigned from the BBC:
"There isa shocking lack of public information on the entire thermonuclear question.
"The public is encouraged not to think too deeply about _ the whole question of nuclear weapons.
VA mystique has grown up around the subject and now it is regarded as a field to which only ‘qualified experts ' are granted entry."
British critic Kenneth Tynan also saw the film. Afterward, he wrote:
"In refusing to show it, the BBC is like a doctor withholding the truth from a patient who is suffering from a potentially fatal | disease.
' "So long as adequate warning is given to depressives and other victims of nervous illness, it should not only be televised but screened not just here but everywhere on earth -- especially in countries that possess or would: like to possess the bomb." —
L'a be hard put “to “disagree with Tynan. "The War Game" - is a film that demands action. It would be a shame if it finished up on the art-cinema circuit. For