Military Train Film Review

Military Train Film Review

Photo Credit: Cornell University Library

Military Train is first and foremost a Japanese approved Korean film released in 1938. Therefore, it essentially is a propaganda film to the Korean people to try to gain their cooperation. Therefore, the themes in this film are very slanted towards a pro-Japanese stance and go against some of the material that has been learned about Japanese colonization. However, there are elements throughout the film that do reinforce what has been learned about Japanese occupation.

        One of the main themes of Military Train is of loyalty to Japan. In the movie the main hero is Jum-Yong, who drives trains for the Japanese. He loves his job and sees it as a significant honor to have the opportunity to drive a military train. He believes assisting the Japanese Empire is the right and honorable thing to do. The movie shows that being loyal to the empire will result in good things happening to you. Jum-Yong is seen to be popular. He has many friends. He has a good job he enjoys. He gets the privilege of driving military trains to the frontlines, and to top it off his older brother finally returns to Korea from Manchuria. He is a good Imperial citizen and is rewarded for being one.

        The other main theme of Military Train is if one is not loyal to Japan there are serious consequences. Won-jin represents one who is not loyal to Japan and receives punishment for being disloyal. Unlike Jum-Yong, Won-jin does not appear to have many friends. It actually seems like Jum-Yong is his best, and only friend. Won-jin never has a job in the movie, and in the end loses everything he holds dear. He loses his best friend, and he is unable to marry his love, Young-sim. In the end he sacrifices his life as repentance for his disloyalty. He says in death he will protect the railroad and the empire in spirit. He also calls himself a puppet spy and that he committed a great crime against society. Those sound like pro-Japanese statements.

        There are many aspects of the film that go against what we have learned in class. Korean nationalists are portrayed negatively in the film. They are seen as sneaky exploiters who hurt the Korean people. The main nationalist seen in the movie is the definition of sneaky. He takes pictures of the military trains in a restricted area and then lies about what he was doing. He eavesdrops on Young-Sim’s conversation with Jum-Yong and Won-jin. He then exploits Won-jin’s situation. He exploits a fellow Korean! Another misconception delivered by the movie is that Koreans are happy under Japanese rule. The local Korean women in the village appear to be happy. The Koreans working the trains are joyful. Nobody is seen being oppressed or unhappy. However, it is clear that was not the reality in Korea. There is a lot of documentation about the suffering Koreans felt especially by 1938. The Kominka movement launched in 1937 and directly caused much suffering for the Koreans. The timing of the movie makes sense. It was released in 1938 and was a tool to convince Koreans to become loyal imperial subjects, which was in line with their thoughts behind the Kominka movement.

        There are a few elements of the film that do reinforce what has been learned in the class. The movie does a good job at portraying the situation in Korea during the colonization. The movie shows the transition Korea was going through from traditional Korea to a modern Korea. Viewers see hanboks, traditional homes, old style laundry, and heard p’ansori, all of which represent traditional Korea. Viewers also se trains, railroads, western style dress, telephones, and cigarettes, which represent the modernizing of Korea. In fact elements of traditional and modernizing Korea are shown together on screen. For instance while Young-sim waits for her eldest brother at the train station she wears a hanbok. Another element of Korean life at the time that has been taught in class is that most Koreans were simply trying to survive during Japanese occupation. Most characters in the movie were not purposely trying to get involved with the independence movement, nor were they trying to gain power with the Japanese. They were simple normal people who were trying to live as best they could and be happy. Young-sim simply wanted to be free from being a geisha and marry her lover, Won-jin. Won-jin simply wanted to free Young-sim and marry her. Jum-yong wanted to drive trains and end up marrying his girlfriend. They did not have vast plans to expel the Japanese, or to bring Japanese control further in Korea.

        One interesting aspect of the movie is Young-sim and what she represents. She sacrifices herself and is oppressed for hopes of a better future. She can be seen as a metaphor for Korea starting when the Japanese occupied it to the 1990s when it had its first democratically elected president. It is very interesting because in Korean cinema up to the 1990s there is a common theme of having a Korean woman being oppressed, or sacrificing herself for her husband or family as a metaphor for Korea and its suffering. Sopyonje is another example of this metaphor. Young-sim became a gisaeng to fund her older brother’s education. She could be a metaphor for Korea sacrificing its sovereignty in order to quickly modernize in the hope it could one day be a strong, independent nation. It is peculiar that this sort of symbolism is even present as far back to 1938 when the Japanese authorities decided what could be in Korean films.