In Japanese, “shi kata ga nai” means “it can't be helped”. As a phrase, it represents the philosophical basis of the Japanese cultural reserve, through which adversity is never acknowledged. Nancy Okura is a Canadian of Japanese decent. During the Second World War, she was involuntarily removed from her home and relocated to an internment camp by the Government of Canada. Shi kata ga nai prevented Nancy Okura from ever speaking about her internment.
A sobering look at the brutal treatment of Japanese-Americans before, during, and after WWII as well as the global repercussions that resulted.
A documentary about the Topaz War Relocation Center, a Japanese internment camp during WWII.
A poetic retelling of the experiences of Joseph Murakami, a fourteen-year-old boy from Darwin, who is summarily rounded up and interned by his government on the basis of his ethnicity, leaving wounds unhealed to this day.
At the start of World War II, Japanese Americans living on the West Coast were faced with the threat of forced removal and incarceration in concentration camps. A small number took their fate in their own hands, fleeing to interior states, becoming refugees in their own country, on a forced migration into the unknown. Before They Take Us Away is the first feature documentary to chronicle the untold stories of the “self-evacuees” who spent the war years outside the camps, as they struggled to rebuild their lives and overcome poverty, isolation, hostility and racial violence.
Samuel Wilder King, a descendant of Scottish sailors and Hawaiian royalty, served as a distinguished Naval officer in both World Wars before becoming Governor of the Hawaii Territory. This short film delves into King’s fearless leadership—from navigating the high seas during WWI to fighting against the internment of Japanese Americans in Hawaii during WWII—ultimately championing Hawaii's path to statehood as the 50th star on the American flag.
