Nankyoku Tairiku - Man/Dogs Vs. Nature - Final Thoughts

I saw the 1983 film adaptation of this story and I remembered I cried a lot. I have a weakness for dogs because I am a dog owner. When I see a dog that was portrayed onscreen and acts as if its' struggling, it really pulls my heartstrings. And, I had the same feeling as I watch this drama.

This story takes place several years after World War II, where Japan was slowly recovering from their economic downfall. Since Japan lost to the Americans, they were mostly viewed as the outcast from the other nation's point of view. But, Japanese officials decided to launch an Antarctica expedition to help boost their nation's confidence. They have sent a team of 11 people and 15 Sakhalin Huskies as sleigh dogs to first set foot on Antarctica. They've spent nearly a year in the base camp in Antarctica and now they were getting ready to leave so that a second team can come in and continue the expedition. However, due to the severe weather conditions, they cannot go back to their base camp and retrieve the dogs that are still left at the base. At the same time, they are not able to send the next team in so, they'll have to remain on the ship and wait until the storm clears. But the weather have gotten even worse and they are not able to do anything about the dogs. The expedition team, Japanese officials and the ship's crew were having huge arguments over whether of not they should save these dogs. In the end, they've made a decision to retreat because they do not want to put their own crew and the ship in jeopardy. But all 15 dogs still remain in Antarctica to fend for themselves.

From that point on, things were starting to look real sad and depressing. But don't worry, there is still some hope left. As the team members of the Antarctica expedition return home, they felt guilty about leaving those dogs behind. And so, the original team members decided to launch a third expedition to rescue these dogs.

It's not just the actors who acted so well, but also the dogs in this drama acted really well that they deserve an award. All 15 dogs being left alone in Antarctic and they have survive on their own. Unfortunately, not all of them are able to survive. And, that's a signal for me to grab a tissue box.

I was wondering if the drama actually shot some footages in Antarctica because some of the scenes where the actors and the dogs were struggling through its' treacherous environment of Antarctica and its' scenery looked so real. But I don't think that the production crew would put their actors and dogs in danger. So, probably the outside footage were shot in some other cold place. Or, it was probably shot in Hokkaido, the northern part of Japan where it gets a lot of snow. I mean, that's where the original movie was filmed in that location. I think that shooting in a location like Hokkaido would probably make more sense. And maybe, with the help of CGI.

I'm just nitpicking here, but I was a little disappointed that after the expedition team left Antarctica, the drama only showed some quick scenes of the dogs and focused more on the humans. I mean, I don't mind that they showed the human side of the story and what was going on behind the scenes while the dogs were stranded in Antarctica. But the main selling point of the this story were the dogs. Some of the human scenes drags on and gets dull to the point where I started to to tune out a little. But I guess it's just me. The main reason why watch this drama are because of the dogs.

On a side note, there was Disney's movie adaption called Eight Below. In that movie, they've just replace the Japanese explores with American explores and changed the timeline to modern times. They added some light-heartedness to the story and sugar coated the ending where all the dogs survive, but in reality not all of them survived. But it's a typical Disney theme of happy endings. Despite the ending changed, I still cried.

However, I thought that this drama did a great job in portraying a genuine relationship between man and dog. These dogs aren't just sleigh dogs, but man's best friend. I thought that the Antarctica expedition was good for them not only to regain Japan's pride, but also to uncover the bonds between human and dog. It was good true story drama.