Ichikawa is often compared with Dostoevsky and tonight's two films, with their brooding, conscience-driven heroes-one, a Mishkin-like "idiot," the other a tortured intellectual-perhaps exemplify the comparison. In Burma at the close of the war, a Japanese detachment is taken prisoner and awaits repatriation. Mizushima, the harp-playing scout for the group, is dispatched by the British to inform an obstinate fighting unit of Japan's surrender. He arrives too late, and what this simple man encounters-bodies of his countrymen lying scattered in the woods-leaves him gripped with an obsession. Mizushima becomes a monk, and determines to remain in Burma to bury the dead, and thereby expiate the sins of war. The Burmese Harp works on many levels: as a dramatization of the conflicts between men in war it is unparalleled; and as an elegy of Japan's war dead, it is haunting, linking the simple beauty of music (even the soldiers sing in harmony) with a sense of loss. The film catapaulted the director to fame, winning the Venice Film Festival prize.