Cullum, Grave of the Fireflies

Grave of the Fireflies was one of the most depressing and slightly life changing films I have ever seen. There are very few films in the world that could move you the way Grave of the Fireflies could move you. The film follows two siblings’ struggle for survival and love for each other. At the very beginning of the film, you discover that whatever the two siblings are going through, they do not survive it. Throughout the whole course of the movie you find yourself wishing they will live; that there will be a happy ending. 

The film takes place during the years of 1944-1945, at the very end of WWII. In the beginning of the movie, you see a man throw a fruit tin can, that he picks off a corpse, into some grass. The lid comes off and fireflies and Setsuko emerge from it. Setsuko sees the body of her dead brother and her eyes get wide at the sight of her brother. Before she can reach the body, her big brothers hand is on her shoulder and the flashback starts.

Seita, the big brother, and Setsuko, the little sister, find themselves orphaned after the bombing of their home, Kobe’. Their mother has passed away due to fatal wounds after the bombing and their father has died fighting for their country. In my opinion, one of the most moving elements in the film is how much Seita tries to protect Setsuko and how you can see how much they love each other just by their actions towards one another. 

The two lived with their aunt, briefly, but left their aunts house because she was treating them so unfairly. He even gave them the supplies he had buried at his house. He kept one thing from his former life and that was a fruit tin can. She was giving them really small portions and took half of the rice that Seita bought with the money he got from selling his mother’s kimonos. She was taking their rations and half of the rice that was rightfully theirs’. When they are one their own, farmers won’t sell them rice because they don’t even have enough for themselves.

        The two find themselves all alone, living in an abandoned air-raid shelter and poor.  One night, Setsuko brings a bunch of fireflies into the shelter and they light up the room. The two experience a short-lived moment of happiness together. When Setsuko wakes up and finds then dead, she buries every single one and asks why did they die, why do they live such short lives and why did their mother died. This is an important scene. Fireflies are beautiful creatures, but they have short lives. You appreciate them more because you don’t see them a lot. Setsuko, Seita and their mother are like fireflies. In the eyes of children, mothers are very important, beautiful people. Their mother, like the fireflies, had a short life. Setsuko and Seita also died very young. The point Nosaka is trying to make is that life is beautiful but it is short so appreciate it as much as you can until you burn out and die.

        Setsuko becomes malnutritioned and the doctors won’t give them food to feed her. At a last hope, Seita goes to the bank to take out all of his mothers money to buy food to save her even though Setsuko begs him not to leave her. When he gets back, Setsuko is on the edge of death and is hallucinating. Seita’s younger sister Setsuko dies and he gives her a proper burial. He uses some of the money to buy a really nice ‘coffin’ to cremate her in and keeps some of her ashes in his fruit tin can. Seita dies not long after his sister.