Minoru: memory of exile

With the bombing of the American naval base at Pearl Habour on December 7, 1941, the position of Japanese Canadians was altered dramatically. This is the story of one among the thousands of Japanese families that were affected by a growing atmosphere of racism and rejection that saw Japanese Canadians dispatched to internment camps in the mountains of British Columbia and following the end of the war, given the choice to be deported to Japan, whether it was their birth place or otherwise, or be placed in working groups throughout Canada. Directed by Michael Fukushima, this is a short documentary film interspersed with classical animation and archival material about his father, Minoru, and his experiences, first as a nine year old, of their family’s loss of property, their transferral to internment camps and then attempted resettlement in Japan. With its sensitive reflection on memory and survival and his own relationship with his father, Fukushima’s work continues the study until the Canadian government’s official apology and compensation for loss and suffering in the 1980s and interrogates his own sense of being a Canadian after this time.