「風立ちぬ」戦争と日本人 The Wind Rises: The Japanese War Experience (Part 1)

宮崎駿と半藤一利の座談会 (2013年08月)からの抜粋
Excerpts from Dialogue between Hayao Miyazaki and Kazutoshi Hando (August 2013):
 

Source: Eiga.com
 
半藤一利：映画（風立ちぬ）は、昭和の初め、日本が戦争の泥沼にはまっていく時期を舞台に、そこに生きた人たち、暮らしぶりや風景が丁寧に描かれています。私は昭和5年の生まれですが、父や母の生きたのはこんな風景だったのだろうか、という感慨がありました。そこで、零戦や九六式艦上戦闘機などの名機を設計した堀越二郎という実在の人物を主人公にした。これも初めての試みですね。そこに、堀辰雄のラブロマンス「風立ちぬ」や「菜穂子」の世界が入ってくる。私は、これはまさに「宮崎版昭和史」だと思いました。だから、いささか気が早い話だけども、次回作はますます大変ではないかと、勝手な感想を持ったわけです。
Kazutoshi Hando: The Wind Rises painstakingly depicts the early part of the Showa Period (Dec 1926-Jan 1989), providing us a window into people’s lives and what Japan looked like as it became mired in the mud of war. I was born in Showa 5 (1930), and as I watched the film, I couldn’t help but think that this is the world my parents knew. But you went and tried something new: creating a picture about this period whose main protagonist was Jiro Horikoshi, a historical figure responsible for the design of the Mitsubishi Zero Fighter and Navy Type 96 Carrier-based Fighter (A5M). You then mixed in elements from Tatsuo Hori’s romantic novels The Wind Has Risen and Naoko. I really felt like I was watching the definitive Miyazaki account of the early Showa Period. I may be getting ahead of myself, but I couldn’t help but think you’ve really made it tough for yourself going into the next picture you make.
 
宮崎駿：おそれいります。でも、この先はもうないから大丈夫ですよ。
Hayao Miyazaki: Well thank you very much for your sentiments. But don’t go worrying about me. I’m pretty much done making pictures.
 
半藤：そのことありませんよ。私なんて今年で八十三になりましたが、いまだに現役です（笑）。
Hando: I’m not buying that. Look at me. I just turned 83 this year (2013), and I’m still working away (chuckles).
 
宮崎：そう言われると一言もありませんが（笑）。これまでと同じようなやり方でアニメーションを作るのは、もうやめた方がいいと思っているんです。プロデューサー（鈴木敏夫氏）なんかは「これは宮さんの遺言ですね」と言っていますよ。今回の「風立ちぬ」は構想からだと5年、作画に入ってから数えても2年かかりました。
Miyazaki: When you put it like that, there’s really nothing I can say (chuckles). Actually, I’m thinking about bidding farewell to the way I’ve made movies over the years. Our producer at Ghibli (Toshio Suzuki) said he thinks The Wind Rises is kind of my last will and testament. The film took five years to make when counting back to the concept stage, and two years to complete when going from the point when we began hammering out the drawings.
 

半藤一利（左）と宮崎駿（右）
Kazutoshi Hando (left) and Hayao Miyazaki (right)
Source: J-cast News
 
半藤：五年もですか？
Hando: Five years in total…
 
宮崎：すると、あと五年後に自分がどうなっているか、何を作るべきなのか、と考えると、なかなか難しいですね。もともと、この「風立ちぬ」は前作「崖の上のポニョ」の後に、ある模型雑誌に連載したカラー漫画だったんです。僕は、アニメーションは子供のために作る、という考えなので、この漫画はいわば趣味として描いていたものでした。堀越二郎はじめ登場人物たちみんな豚にしてしまったり。
Miyazaki: It’s tough for me to imagine what I’ll be like five years down the road, or what kind of film I should make. Originally, The Wind Rises was just this serial color manga insert (note: manga are generally black and white) for a model magazine that I was working on after the release of the Ponyo. Children are always at the forefront for me when I do animation, and this manga was just something I was doing for fun. That was reflected in the way I depicted the characters, drawing Jiro Horikoshi and others as pigs.
 
宮崎：今はファンタジーを作ることがますます難しくなっています。東日本大震災、原発事故などに直面し、映画の中だけ幸せ、なんてありえない。そう考えてしまうんです。そこに鈴木プロデューサーが “「風立ちぬ」をやりましょう”と提案してきた。しかし、零戦の設計者が主人公で、戦前の日本が舞台では、どうやっても子供が土俵の外に置かれてしまう。そうしたら、“子供たちもいつか大人になって分かる日がくる”と言った人間がいて、そうかも知れない、と。
Miyazaki: It’s gotten much tougher to do fantasy now. The Great East Japan Earthquake and subsequent nuclear disaster have weighed heavy on the mind, making me feel that it’s impossible for films to be this joyful place of refuge. But producer Suzuki approached me and said we should do The Wind Rises. I was a little reluctant at first given that the subject matter isn’t exactly tailored made for kids, especially since it takes place in pre-war Japan and the main protagonist is the man who engineered the Zero Fighter. Then someone said that there will come a day when these kids grow up, and then they’ll be able to understand the film. I thought to myself, yeah, that might be the case.
 
堀越は宮崎さん本人ではありせんか
Horikoshi as a reflection of Miyazaki himself
 
半藤: なるほど。それにしても、堀越二郎を堀辰雄の世界に送り込むという着想には、意表をつかれました。堀越二郎と堀辰雄は一歳違いなんですね。されに言えば、堀越が零戦の開発に取り組み始めたのが昭和十二年 (1937)。そして堀が「風立ちぬ」を書き上げたのも同じ昭和十二年なんのです。一見まるで毛色の違う、しかしまさしく同時代を生きた二人を結びつけたのは非凡なアイデアですよ。そもそも、なぜ堀越二郎を主人公に、と考えたのですか？
Hando: I see. But I feel that you surprised a lot of people by deciding to put Jiro Horikoshi into the world of Tatsuo Hori. The two men were only a year apart in real life. On top of that, the year Horikoshi began developing the Zero Fighter was 1937, the same year in which Hori finished writing his novel The Wind Has Risen. On the surface these look like two completely different individuals, but they both lived through the same period of history. I thought it was a stroke of genius to create that connection between the two. Indeed, what led you to settle on Jiro Horikoshi as the main character for your film?
 

実際の堀越二郎
Jiro Horikoshi
Source: BS Asahi

宮崎: 彼を描かないと、この国のおかしさが描けないと思ったんです。僕は、ある時まで「戦前」という時代を想像できませんでした。目の前は焼け野原だらけで、あれだけの人が死んだ。南方や中国では悲惨なことをいっぱい起こしたことを知ると、あまりにもこの国が屈辱的に感じられ、戦前の日本は、”灰色の世界”としか思えなかった。そんな中で、人はどうやって生きたのか。自分の親父はいい時代だったと言っていました。どうも、うまくかみ合わなかった。それと、ヒコーキ好きや、架空戦記もののマニアから零戦を取り戻したかったんです。
Miyazaki: I felt that portraying him was crucial to showing how strange this country is. For a long time I couldn’t imagine what pre-war Japan was like. As a small child, all I knew was the burned out landscapes (from the bombing raids) and the fact that a lot of people had died. Later on when I learned about all the atrocious things that Japan had done in southern Asia and in China, I felt a sense of humiliation about this country. Pre-war Japan was simply this “gray world” to me, and I always wondered how people went about their lives in that period. My father said it was a great time. Reflecting on all this, things just don’t line up right. Another motivating factor was a desire to wrest the Zero Fighter back from all those airplane aficionados and people obsessed with fictional war accounts.
 

「風立ちぬ」での零戦
Zero Fighter in The Wind Rises
Source: Studio Ghibli
 
宮崎:　堀越二郎という人は、著書を読んでみても、奥歯に物が挟まっている 感じで、本音が分からないところがありますね。ただ、零戦のテスト飛行を見つめて、一言「美しい」と洩らしている。僕は、これが堀越の本音だったと思ったんです。彼が作りたかったのは戦闘機ではなく、美しい飛行機だった。
Miyazki: Books about Jiro Horikoshi leave you with the impression that he was not really one to open up, making it tough to know what he thought. There’s an account of him observing one of the Zero Fighter test flights, and the only thing he said was “that’s beautiful”. But I really latched on to that, because I felt it provides us with a window into his mind. He didn’t want to create a fighter plane. I believe that all he really wanted to do was produce a beautiful piece of aircraft. 
 
半藤: 零戦の設計を巡っては、海軍内で大論争が起きました。飛行隊長の源田実は格闘能力、つまり運動性能を優先させろと言い、海軍航空廠（かいぐんこうくうしょう）の柴田武雄は速度と航続距離を要求する。私は、二人とも会って話を聞いたことがありますが、戦後になっても仇敵のように相手を罵り合っていましたね。結局、設計者の堀越には、両方とも満たせという無理難題が押し付けられたのですが、堀越はそれを見事にクリアしました。そこのあたりを、宮崎さんは映画の中で、とても戯画的に処理していて、痛快でした。
Hando: There was an intense debate within the Imperial Japanese Navy about what kind of plane the Zero Fighter should be. Captain Minoru Genda, who headed his own fighter squadrons, was adamant that the craft possess excellent maneuverability that would give it an edge in dogfights. On the opposite side of the table was Captain Takeo Shibata from the Naval Aeronautical Technology Institution. The most important criteria for him were speed and the ability to fly long distances. I had the opportunity to meet with both of these men years after the war, and even then they still despised each other, cursing the other guy whenever talking about him. Anyway, they thrust this impossible engineering task on Horikoshi, demanding that he meet both of their demands. And yet, Horikoshi was able to deliver on both, and he did so magnificently. I really got a kick out of your caricaturized depictions of these two officers in the film.

源田実少佐（左）と柴田武雄少佐（右）
Captain Minoru Genda (left) and Captain Takeo Shibata (right)
Source: Wikipedia Commons

宮崎：戦後、源田は、東京大空襲を指揮したカーティス・ルメイにわざわざ勲章を与えた人物ですね。そんな連中のことを真面目に描きたくなかったんです。
Miyazaki: Speaking of Genda, after the war he received a special honor from Curtis LeMay, the mastermind behind the Great Tokyo Air Raid. I didn’t want to give a proper depiction of guys like Genda.
 
半藤: 彼らが帰った後、上司に「お前聞いていないだろう？」と聞かれて、堀越が「はい」と答える（笑）。我々は軍部の無理な要求を押し付けられた堀越の苦悩を考えがちですが、宮崎さんは、堀越はそんなことは関係なく、自分の好きな、美しい飛行機を作ったのだ、と考える。これは新しい解釈だと思いました。
Hando: Horikoshi’s superiors asked him, “you didn’t hear all that, did you” after the Navy guys left, to which he replied, “No I didn’t” (chuckles). We tend to think that Horikoshi really struggled with the impossible demands of the military, but it seems you felt he didn’t really worry about that. He just went about making the beautiful plane that he wanted to created. I found that to be a new take on the individual.
 
宮崎: そうですね、もしかすると自分の理想の飛行機に、軍の要求を合わせたではないか、と。。。
Miyazaki: I think so. Perhaps all he was doing was meshing the spec demands of the military with the type of beautiful plane that he wanted to make.
 
半藤: その堀越は、宮崎さん本人ではありませんか？周りの要求はどうあろうと、俺は俺の好きなものを作るという信念を貫く。（脇を見て）。プロデューサーさん、そうでしょう（笑）。
Hando: Could it be that the Horikoshi we see in the film is really a reflection of yourself, Miyazaki-san? You just go about making the film that you want to make, paying little heed to the demands of those around you. (Looks off to the side to the producer), isn’t that right? (everyone laughs)
 
宮崎: 僕はそれしか出来ないからやっているだけです（笑）。
Miyazaki: That’s all I can do. Can’t really help it because that’s who I am (laughs).
 
半藤: さらに言えば、 堀越さんたちが九六式艦戦や零戦を設計していた当時、飛行機が次の戦争の主役になると、予測できた人は、山本五十六などごく少数の人たちだけだったのです。だから、堀越さんたちの仕事は、非常に孤独な戦いでもあった。
Hando: When Horikoshi and his colleagues were designing the Zero Fighter and Navy Type 96 Carrier-based Fighter (A5M), Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto was probably one of the few people among the Japanese military brass that recognized that aircraft would take center stage in the next major war. Horikoshi and his colleagues’ work was ultimately a very lonely task indeed.
 

山本五十六
Isoroku Yamamoto
Source: Nishinippon Shimbun
 
半藤: また、これも「遅れてきた国」の悲しさなのですが、昭和八、九年ごろには、先進諸国では、エネルギーの主役が石炭から石油に移るという大転換を迎えていたのです。ところが、日本の軍部のほとんどは、依然として石炭中心のエネルギー観のままだった。第二次大戦の主役となったのは、飛行機と戦車でしたが、どちらも石油がないと動けない。石油への転換についていけなかったということは、その意味で致命的でした。
Hando: Sadly, the fact that many in the Japanese military were slow to recognize the importance of airplanes in combat reflected how Japan always lagged behind the more advanced nations of the world. In 1933-34, these nations were already making the switch from coal to petroleum as their main source of energy. However, the majority of Japan’s military brass was still stuck on coal. Aircraft and tanks were two of the main weapons in WW2, and both of these needed gasoline to run. In that respect, Japan’s inability to keep pace with other countries and make the switch to oil as its main energy source proved fatal.
 
宮崎: その意味では、今も似たような状況にありますね。石油文明が終わりにさしかかり、原子力が生き詰まっているのに、まだ日本は大転換に舵を切れないでいます。堀越や本庄（堀越の同僚）は十年の遅れを必死になって追いかけたのですが、残念なことに追いつけなかった。
Miyazaki: Listening to you say that, I feel that Japan is standing at a similar crossroads right now. This oil-driven civilization of ours is coming to an end, and things don’t look all that bright for nuclear power. And yet, even though the writing’s on the wall, Japan can’t seem to take that first step forward and pursue the change that is needed. Horikoshi and Honjo (Horikoshi’s colleague) gave it their all trying to close that 10 year technological gap, but unfortunately in the end they failed.