The Most Beautiful


is a 1944 Japanese drama and propaganda film written and directed by Akira Kurosawa. The film is set in an optics factory during the Second World War when the film was produced.

Plot

The film depicts the struggle for the workers at a lens factory to meet production targets during World War II. They continually drive themselves, both singly and as a group, to exceed the targets set for them by the factory directors.

Critical reception

Paul Anderer of Columbia University has commented on the subtext of the film having been released during the war years for Japan. Anderer offers the opinion that; "It is as if Kurosawa himself were in this lineup, frozen inside wartime, when any significant movement or resistance to the authority would be stillborn. Surrounded by a censorship apparatus far more resourceful and intimidating, he would later claim, than anything the American Occupation threw his way, he had few thematic or tonal options: historical tributes to Japanese spiritual and martial values, or patriotic odes to factor production and sacrificial domesticity ".