Product Details

• Format: Color, DVD, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: PBS
• DVD Release Date: April 27, 2004
• Run Time: 170 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 3.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (7 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000BITU2K
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #38,953 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

Studio: Paramount Home Video Release Date: 10/20/2005

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

14 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The things we don't know about Japan..., October 31, 2008

By 

Pistachio Disguisey (Dallas, TX) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Japan: Memoirs of a Secret Empire (DVD)

In hindsight, and after watching this documentary, it's pretty easy to see how we got into the Great Wars against Japan. It's also pretty easy to see how we could have avoided them with a little cultural understanding.

As usual, PBS puts together a well researched, balanced report. As a bonus, it lacks the usual bias that most documentaries seem to inherently possess, and offers very little in a way of "directorial opinion".

I did, however, feel that it relied to heavily on visuals at times, especially on the section covering the Meiji period. I would have preferred a little more detail, especially concerning the upcoming culture wars (not covered in this documentary).

That being said, the visuals themselves are nothing to complain about, and the art direction is excellent. And the music! What a great score for a documentary!

Bottom Line: Recommended, especially for those seeking an intro into Japanese history and culture.

17 of 20 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Good Visuals Undercut by Eurocentric Focus, April 28, 2009

By 

Andrew Arvesen - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Japan: Memoirs of a Secret Empire (DVD)

I picked up this video for use with my 8th Grade class. We do a unit on Japanese literature of the Medieval and Tokugawa periods and I used Episode 2 as an introduction.

I loved the visual style of the film. It is striking and dramatic, with re-enactment footage helping the viewer to visualize the clothing, etiquette, and lifestyles of the period. A great deal of valuable information is covered in a compressed period of time without being difficult to understand. So far so good.

However, the film has a very "Eurocentric" attitude right from the get-go. Before Episode 1 even begins, the voice-over announces that Japan was a world completely the opposite of Europe. The rest of the film continues to hammer this idea of Japan as "other." Although the film quotes generously from primary sources about the period. most of these sources are European missionaries. The implication is that we can only understand the strange Japanese culture by reading the memoirs of Portugese Jesuits who spent a few months there. This ignores the fact that Japan at the time was certainly just as accomplished a literary culture as any in Europe, with plenty of authors writing compelling works showing much greater understanding and insight about the culture than European visitors could offer. The film also seems obsessed with the fate of the Christian religion in Japan. This is an interesting story, but it is really only significant to the country's history when discussing the final uprising of the Christians which led directly to the Shogun closing Japan off from outside visitors. Meanwhile, important topics like Shinto, the Emperor, and Zen Buddhism are barely mentioned.

One section that does use a Japanese primary source is the valuable discussion in Episode 2 of travel during the Tokugawa period. The film uses the journal of a Japanese woman, describing the special difficulties women faced in traveling around Japan. This was interesting and enlightening. It was also good to see a woman's perspective in the middle of such a male-dominated tale of power struggles and war.
Overall, I give the film a middling review. The visuals and wealth of information presented is good, but the distorted, Eurocentric focus is a real drawback.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars informative, with colorful visual imagery, but little correlation between the narration and video, April 24, 2010

By 

Tsukikenn "tsukikenn" (Honolulu, HI, USA) - See all my reviews

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Japan: Memoirs of a Secret Empire (Amazon Instant Video)

This video is very informative. As a moderately knowledgeable person on Japanese history during the "warring era", I still learned new information. The visual images are colorful. However, this is more like an audio book with very loosely associated video images. It doesn't contain the variety of re-enactments, "on-location" views of historical events, historical photos and/or art work that connect directly to the spoken narrative.