Origin: Japan Palestine | Documentary | Director: Masao Adachi & Kôji Wakamatsu | 69 minutes

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The Red Army-PFLP Declaration of World War

Masao Adachi - Koji Wakamatsu 1971 docu 69 min.

This rarely seen work is a milestone in militant filmmaking and vital
testimony to an era of global revolutionary beginnings. Renowned, and
already "notorious", Japanese filmmakers and activists Masao Adachi and
Koji Wakamatsu stopped in Beirut on their return from the Cannes Film
Festival in 1971. There, in collaboration with a newlyemerging Japanese Red
Army (JRA) cadre and leaders of the Popular Front for the Liberation of
Palestine (PFLP) including Ghassan Kanafani and Leila Khaled, they produced
this newsreelstyle depiction of the everyday activities of Palestinian
fighters so as to call for a worldwide Maoist revolution. The Red Army /
PFLP Declaration of World War sometimes seems technically crude compared to
Wakamatsu and Adachi's larger oeuvre. But it is ultimately the film's
urgency and unashamed militancy that sets it apart from that betterknown
work - in which the two had been compelled to circumnavigate the Japanese
censor. This film does not flinch from its message. It offers a rare and
tantalising window on a key chapter of collaboration between Japanese and
Palestinian revolutionaries and filmmakers and remains striking testimony
to the shared optimism and commitment of the PFLP and JRA's young cadre.

Full feature: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vRvKNmcUqDU

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View trailer