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}} is a 1983 Japanese film directed by Koreyoshi Kurahara and starring Ken Takakura. Its plot centers on the 1958 ill-fated Japanese scientific expedition to the South Pole, its dramatic rescue from the impossible weather conditions on the return journey, the relationship between the scientists and their loyal and hard-working Sakhalin huskies, particularly the lead dogs Taro and Jiro, and fates of the 15 dogs left behind to fend for themselves. The film was selected as the Japanese entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 56th Academy Awards, but was not accepted as a nominee.〔Margaret Herrick Library, Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences〕 It entered into the 34th Berlin International Film Festival, at the Japan Academy Awards was nominated for the best film, cinematography, lighting, and music score, winning the Popularity award for the two dogs Taro and Jiro as most popular performer, as well the cinematography and reader's choice award at the Mainichi Film Award. It was a big cinema hit, and held the Japanese box office record for a domestic film until it was surpassed by Miyazaki Hayao's Princess Mononoke in 1997. The original electronic score was created by Greek musician Vangelis, who had recently written music for ''Chariots of Fire'' and ''Blade Runner''. The soundtrack is available worldwide on CD-audio as ''Antarctica''. ==Plot== In February 1958, the Second Cross-Winter Expedition for the Japanese Antarctic Surveying Team rides on the icebreaker ''Sōya'' to take over from the 11-man First Cross-Winter Expedition. Due to the extreme weather conditions in Antarctica, ''Sōya'' can not get near enough to the Showa Base and they decide not to proceed with the stay-over. The First Cross-Winter Expedition retreats by helicopter, but they have to leave 15 Sakhalin huskies at the unmanned Showa Base. The dogs are left chained at the base, as the team believes that they will soon be returning, but the men are unable to due to fuel shortages. The team is worried about the dogs, as the weather is extremely cold and only one week of food is available. Meanwhile, eight of the fifteen sled dogs manage to break loose from their chains (Riki, Anko, Shiro, Jakku, Deri, Kuma, Taro, and Jiro), but the other seven are not so fortunate. As they journey across the frozen wilderness of Antarctica, the dogs are forced to survive on their own feces, hunting penguins and seals on the ice shelves and even eating the excrement of seals for food. As months pass, several of the dogs die or disappear in the glacier. Riki is fatally injured by a killer whale while trying to protect Taro and Jiro. Anko and Deri fall through the ice and drown in freezing waters. Shiro falls off a cliff to his death, and Jakku and Kuma disappear in the wilderness. Eleven months later, on 14 January 1959, Kitagawa, one of the dog handlers in the first expedition, returns with the Third Cross-Winter Expedition, wanting to bury his beloved dogs. He, along with the two dog-handlers Ushioda and Ochi, recover the frozen corpses of seven dogs, but are even more surprised when they discover that eight of their dogs have broken loose. To everyone's surprise, they are greeted warmly at the base by two dogs, Taro and Jiro, brothers who were born in Antarctica. It is still unknown how and why the brothers survived, because an average husky can only live in such conditions for about one month. In the movie, the director used the data available, together with his imagination, to reconstruct how the dogs struggled with the elements and survived. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Antarctica (1983 film)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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