AllMovie

Here, director Oshima (best-known in America for Merry Christmas, Mr. Lawrence and Empire of the Senses) tells the tragic story of a young man who becomes involved in a confusing political struggle involving film from his camera. Even though he was covering a demonstration, the film he shot of it is fairly ordinary, and he cannot understand why it is important to so many people. His camera is stolen during the demonstration, and the thief, whom he follows, commits suicide. The police are reluctant to return the camera and film to him, and when he does obtain them, his co-workers try to wrest them from him. He repeatedly regains and then loses both the camera and the film, and when he finally views the developed film, the images are uninformative.