Gunkanjima
Director Louidgi Beltrame
Countries France
Duration 33 min
Synopsis
The deserted island of Gunkanjima (Battleship Island) condense JP’s race towards modernity and its organised and willing entry into the industrial era during the Meiji Restoration. This islet, 480m long and 160m wide, surrounded by walls and covered in reinforced concrete blocks, used to be just a desolate reef off the coast of Nagasaki, until Mitsubishi decided to exploit its layers of coal in 1890. These ghostly buildings – deactivated now – ae filmed in all their materiality, like monumental sculptures. These empty shapes are nevertheless inhabited by layers of history: the conditions for production, the ideology behind these sites, the men who built and exploited them.
The deserted island of Gunkanjima (Battleship Island) condense JP’s race towards modernity and its organised and willing entry into the industrial era during the Meiji Restoration. This islet, 480m long and 160m wide, surrounded by walls and covered in reinforced concrete blocks, used to be just a desolate reef off the coast of Nagasaki, until Mitsubishi decided to exploit its layers of coal in 1890. These ghostly buildings – deactivated now – ae filmed in all their materiality, like monumental sculptures. These empty shapes are nevertheless inhabited by layers of history: the conditions for production, the ideology behind these sites, the men who built and exploited them.