In Venice Competition Film ‘Mr Nelson, Did You Kill People?’ Director Tsukamoto Shinya Asks Vital Questions

By Blake Simons

Blake Simons

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Independent filmmaker Tsukamoto Shinya was born 15 years after the end of World War II. “Neither my parents nor my grandparents ever spoke about the war, so I grew up believing, without question, that the world was a bright and peaceful place,” says Tsukamoto. “But beneath the surface, many people were suffering from the dark effects of the war.”

Those effects have weighed heavily on Tsukamoto’s mind over the past decade. Beginning with “Fires on the Plain” in 2014, the filmmaker shifted his focus from inventive genre films to interrogations of the whos and whys of real-world violence. “I remain deeply concerned about the state of the world today,” says Tsukamoto. “More specifically, I worry that Japan may overreact to what is happening in the world, and that we may move closer toward war as a result. That concern never left me since I made ‘Fires.’”

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