This modern and boisterous comedy of errors set during Japan's occupation of China revolves around the effects of the war?and worse, humanity?on one Chinese village. Ma Dasan (actor-director Jiang Wen) and his neighbors find their uneasy peace suddenly jeopardized when partisans give them two POWs for safekeeping. One, a Japanese soldier, provokes the villagers while the other, a Chinese/Japanese interpreter, smoothly mistranslates his slurs. But when no one comes to collect the captives, th villagers must decide whether to set them free or kill them, a choice made more difficult since, while everyone has an opinion, nobody quite knows how to kill. Merging Ealing-style village comedy with the virtuousity of a war film, Devils foregrounds its humanist, intimate concerns.