The Sun

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The Sun

2005

1h 55m

History

Drama

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Popcornmeter

93%

Tomatometer

41 Reviews

78%

Popcornmeter

1,000+ Ratings

Emperor Hirohito (Issei Ogata) of Japan meets with Gen. Douglas MacArthur in 1945.

Critics Consensus

Certainly not for the impatient, Aleksandr Sokurov's deliberately paced look at Hirohito in the waning days of World War II is both enlightening and admirable in its restraint.

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Keith Uhlich

Time Out

Sokurov, who also acted as director of photography, films the character and his surroundings with the eye of a newly arrived visitor to another world.

Rated: 5/5

Nov 18, 2011

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Ben Kenigsberg

Time Out

Rated: 4/5

Nov 17, 2011

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Wesley Morris

Boston Globe

Working from Yuri Arabov and Jeremy Noble's script, Sokurov has a wonderful time not simply with Hirohito and history, but with his filmmaking, which can be oblique to the point of being stultifying. Here he plays with scale.

Rated: 3.5/4

Apr 1, 2010

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Richard Propes

TheIndependentCritic.com

A brilliant film.

Rated: 3.5/4.0

Sep 24, 2020

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David Harris

Spectrum Culture

An astounding work of intimate detail that should not be missed.

Rated: 4/5

Oct 16, 2019

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Paul Dale

The List

With its slow pace, weird stabs at slapstick, and odd stilted performances, The Sun may not be for everyone -- but in its very perverseness, it has to to be noted that this is a unique, mesmerizing, mad and brilliantly intuitive study.

Rated: 4/5

Apr 27, 2019

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Leaburn O

This film was good 👍🏼

Rated 3.5 out of 5 stars

03/25/23

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Audience Member

Oddly hypnotic and fascinating.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

01/16/23

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Audience Member

A heavyweight masterpiece in a lightweight digital form.

Rated 5 out of 5 stars

01/17/23

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Audience Member

Sokurov at his most personal, beautiful and haunting.

Rated 4 out of 5 stars

01/20/23

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Audience Member

Interesting piece of story or history ?!

Rated 2.5 out of 5 stars

02/15/23

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Audience Member

Americans unreflectively view other countries through Hollywood filters, so it takes (for example) seeing the end of the Japanese-American war through a post-Soviet Russian lens to remind us of subjectivity in history.

Rated 3 out of 5 stars

01/22/23

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Aleksandr Sokurov

Director

Issei Ogata

Actor

Robert Dawson

Actor

Kaori Mamoi

Actor

Shiro Sano

Actor

Yuriy Arabov

Screenwriter

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Critics Consensus: New Moon Wanes

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Synopsis

Emperor Hirohito (Issei Ogata) of Japan meets with Gen. Douglas MacArthur in 1945.

Director: Aleksandr Sokurov
Producer: Marco Muller, Igor Kalyonov, Andrey Sigle
Screenwriter: Yuriy Arabov
Production Co: RAI Cinema, Istituto Luce Cinecittà
Genre: History, Drama
Original Language: English
Release Date (Streaming): May 22, 2017
Runtime: 1h 55m