Fragments of the Last Will Standard Blu-ray

Winner of a Japan Academy Prize for Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role and the Blue Ribbon Award for Best Actor. This is the true story of two people's eleven-year love, buffeted by fate while they continued to hope for reunion.

After the Second World War in 1945, Siberia is a world of severe winters and temperatures of minus forty degrees. Brutal labor continues on scant food, and people die one after another in a hellish labor camp. Hatao Yamamoto is there. “Do not abandon the hope of living. The day we return home—damoi—will certainly come,” he keeps telling his despairing fellow prisoners.

Imprisoned on unfounded spying charges, Yamamoto endures because he believes he will again spend his days with his wife Mojimi and their four children in Japan. In the appalling conditions, everyone has closed his heart: Matsuda, wounded by war, decides to remain a bystander; Sergeant Aizawa flaunts his former Japanese military rank; sincere young Shintani dotes on a puppy named Kuro; and Hara, an older acquaintance from Yamamoto's hometown, has changed beyond recognition under the strain. Yamamoto encourages them all without distinction. His concern for his companions and his convictions gradually thaw their frozen hearts.

Eight years after the war ends, a postcard arrives from his wife. Passing through strict censorship, it says, “I am waiting for your return.” Thinking of her raising the children alone, Yamamoto cannot hold back his tears. Everyone senses that damoi is approaching, but his body has already been ravaged by illness. Disregarding the danger, Matsuda begins a desperate strike to demand that Yamamoto be taken to a hospital. It spreads throughout the camp, and Yamamoto finally receives a diagnosis. He is told he has three months to live. While his companions have regained hope through him, his own condition only worsens.

Yamamoto still refuses to give up on seeing his wife. After agonizing over it, the prisoners who admire him urge him to write a final letter. He takes their advice to heart and, with trembling hands, writes his feelings for his family. Entrusted to his companions, the letter should have been kept safe until they returned home. But writing in the camp is regarded as spying, and his letter is cruelly confiscated. Will his feelings remain trapped forever in Siberia? As death approaches, his companions take astonishing action to fulfill his wish. A miracle brought about by people in a postwar labor camp—this is a moving true story.

Video extras comprise teasers, trailers and television spots. Audio extras include main-film commentary by director Takahisa Zeze and Kazunari Ninomiya. The cast features Ninomiya, Keiko Kitagawa, Tori Matsuzaka, Kento Nakajima, Akira Terao, Kenta Kiritani, Ken Yasuda, Eita Okuno, Yuta Kanai, Ayumu Nakajima, Momoko Tanabe, Takara Sakumoto, Soma Santoki, Tomoya Oku, Makiko Watanabe, Masaki Miura, Takashi Yamanaka, Mayumi Asaka, Yoshi Sakou and Yoshie Ichige. Contents and specifications may change.

The region-free standard Blu-ray runs approximately 134 minutes with original Japanese DTS-HD Master Audio 5.1 surround, a separate stereo Japanese audio-description track and Japanese subtitles for viewers with hearing impairments.