The Battle Front for the Liberation of Japan—Summer in Sanrizuka

Shinsuke Ogawa “has been unaccountably neglected in the Western world. . . . [His is an] extraordinary, incisive, and deeply committed body of work" (Jed Rapfogel, Anthology Film Archives). In 1968, Ogawa and the new filmmaking collective Ogawa Pro “followed a brigade of student activists and joined the growing movement of resistance by the farmers and their allies against the forced eviction from their lands to build a new international airport in Narita, near Tokyo. Summer in Sanrizuka is a call-to-arms, a raucous film shot during the first land surveys and the first clashes between the airport authorities and the protesters. The film shows how the students and the farmers were able to forge an alliance and find common ground in order to organize and strengthen their cooperative struggle” (Cinéma du Réel).