Four Days of Snow and Blood

Based on Kazuo Kasahara's book 226, Gosha's turgid and hopelessly undramatic movie reconstructs the failed military coup of 26 February 1936, when a group of emperor-worshipping army officers tried to overthrow the civilian government. Dozens of earlier Japanese movies have dealt with these events, but few have been so wrong-footed: Gosha devotes most of two hours to the political and ethical debates that followed the assassinations, pausing only to weep along with the officers' long-suffering wives. A wretched dog of a movie.