Somehow I made it to just the other day (as you’re reading this) without knowing that in 1983 David Bowie starred in a Japanese war film about the individuals living in a POW camp. The film’s English title is Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence, and the film’s score, by Ryuichi Sakamoto, is highly regarded, possibly moreso even than the film. (I only know this by reading the film’s Wikipedia entry.) The movie doesn’t appear to have any specifically Christmas subtext, except that one of the Japanese characters wishes Mr. Lawrence, one of the non-Japanese characters, a Merry Christmas several times throughout the film. Nevertheless, the title track from the film has apparently become a Christmas standard in Japan. Listening to it now, I’m pretty sure I’ve heard it before, but I’m not super familiar with it.
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