The Burmese Harp (Biruma no tategoto, 1956) is the story of a soldier’s struggle to find a meaning for his life after he confronts the horrors of war. The cast includes: Shoji Yasui (as Mizushima), Rentaro Mikuni (as Captain Inouye), and Taniye Kitabayashi (as the old woman).

The screenplay was written by Natto Wada, based on a story by Michio Takeyama. The music was composed by Akira Ifukube. The photography was by Minoru Yokoyama. The film was produced by Masayuki Takaki, and directed by Kon Ichikawa.

As the film begins, the scene is a battlefield in Burma. It is July 1945. A company of Japanese soldiers has been fighting in the mountains, and has reached the border of Thailand. They are exhausted, and stop to rest at the top of a hill. Private Mizushima begins to play his harp. The music of the harp brings a temporary peace and tranquility to the lives of the soldiers.

The company begins marching again, and reaches a village. They stop to spend the night, but are surrounded by a regiment of British soldiers. They learn that the war ended three days ago, and that the Japanese army has surrendered. The company gives up its weapons, and is taken to a prisoner-of-war camp in Mudon.

When they reach the prison camp, they learn that a unit of Japanese soldiers has refused to surrender. Mizushima is sent with a British soldier to try to persuade the rebel unit to surrender. Mizushima reaches their outpost in the mountains, but the recalcitrant unit of soldiers refuses to surrender. They are all killed by a British mortar attack. Mizushima is the only survivor.

Meanwhile, Mizushima’s comrades wait for him to return to the prison camp. They receive a report from an old woman that Mizushima has been killed with the other soldiers at the Triangle Mountain. However, they still hope that he has survived, and that he will safely return.

Mizushima makes his way slowly back from the Triangle Mountain, which is strewn with the bodies of dead soldiers. He disguises himself as a Buddhist priest. He becomes hungry and exhausted, but is given some food by a group of cattle-herders, who think that he is a priest.

He comes to a desolate valley, where he stops to bury the bodies of dead soldiers. Later, he comes to a river, where he again encounters scenes of horror. The banks of the river are covered by even more bodies of dead soldiers. He waits for a ferryman, who is coming toward the shore, and who takes him by boat to Mudon.

When Mizushima reaches the town of Mudon, he meets a young boy, who is learning to play a harp. He stops to teach the boy to play the harp. Later, Mizushima visits the other soldiers at the prisoner-of-war camp.

He is still wearing the garment of a priest, and a parrot is sitting on his shoulder. He pretends not to recognize the other soldiers, and they are not sure if he is really their missing comrade.

They later see him again, as he walks with the other priests in a parade at a memorial ceremony in honor of dead British soldiers. They are still not sure of his real identity, but he begins to play the harp, and they recognize the sound of his playing. They run to try to find him outside a sanctuary, but he hides inside an image of the reclining Buddha.

He later visits them again at the prison camp, just before they are sent home to Japan. He plays a song as they sing, although he has now abandoned his former identity. He plays a song of farewell, because he will not be returning with them to his country.

As the soldiers leave for Japan, they receive a letter from him saying that he must stay to bury the dead. He says in the letter that as he climbed the mountains and crossed the rivers on his way back from the Triangle Mountain, he was troubled by doubt and despair. As he buried the bodies and bones of dead soldiers, he had asked himself how there could have been such a tragedy. But he had decided that, even if he could not explain such sorrow and desolation, he must try to help relieve the world’s suffering.

He says in his letter that he has now been accepted into the Buddhist priesthood. He feels that it is his duty to pray for the souls of the dead.

As the film ends, Mizushima walks across the battlefield which was seen at the beginning of the film.

An important theme of the film is Mizushima’s evolving change of identity. He is transformed from a soldier to a priest. He is initially a participant in the conflict, but gradually becomes a healer and bringer of peace and harmony.

When Mizushima is sent by his captain to the Triangle Mountain, he becomes a mediator in an attempt to bring an end to the fighting. He is unsuccessful in his effort to end the conflict, and is temporarily brought to a state of despair by the senselessness and horror of war. But he undergoes a spiritual rebirth to become a caregiver for those who have fallen in the conflict.

His fellow-soldiers are later astonished by his physical transformation. But, throughout the film, they see him as a symbol of hope and spiritual regeneration. For them, he represents unselfish dedication, and devotion to duty. He becomes a symbol of caring and compassion.

The harp is also an important symbol in the film, representing harmony and spiritual healing. The hero, Mizushima, plays it gently and skillfully. Though he is transformed when he plays the harp, he is consistent in following his sense of duty.