In every culture there are a few of those places one does remember from certain classes in school or from talks of one's parents and their friends, but their full meaning unravels only as we grow older and seek to know about them. In Germany, the idea of a concentration camp is something which is rather abstract when the knowledge about derives from reading about it, but changes once you have been to one and have taken a tour. While there is still the distance through time, you might get a better picture and understand more as you are standing on the same paths people have been on so many years ago, filled with hopes, fears and uncertainty. As a child director, Ann Kaneko heard her parents talking about camps at dinnertime, but was unable to fully comprehend what they meant until she began researching about the World War II incarceration of Japanese Americans. Ultimately, her drive to find more about the topic brought her to Manzanar, where, during that time period, over 10,000 Japanese-Americans were relocated and had to make a living under tough conditions.
Manzanar, Diverted: When Water Becomes Dust is screening at San Diego Asian Film Festival
In the end, Kaneko directed “Manzanar, Diverted: When Water Becomes Dust”, a documentary which covers the history behind Manzanar and the Owens Valley, a few hours outside Los Angeles, but also the current struggle of its residents for their livelihood, especially concerning water rights, property and health hazards caused by mining and toxic gases. The story of the Japanese-Americans who were forced to relocate to Manzanar became closely connected to the Native American tribes living in those regions as well as their struggles to make a living, for property and, most importantly of all, for water rights. Over the course of its running time, Kaneko retells the story of these two groups while linking it to present battles with the city of Los Angeles whose growth into a metropolis has caused several problems and has put the lives of many people at risk.
Unsurprisingly, given her approach, Ann Kaneko's movie is both a documentary about the history of Manzanar and its residents, but also an environmental film emphasizing how urban growth changes the landscape of the earth, and also the living conditions of many people. Through interviews with people such as Kathy Jefferson Bancroft, a Lone Pine Tribal Historic Preservation Officer, and Monica Mariko Embrey, a third generation activist in support of the idea to keep the site as a memorial to the struggle of Japanese-Americans in the 1940s and who wants to raise awareness of the environmental issues caused by mining and the drainage of lakes and rivers, the audience understands the connection of these cultures, to the place itself and through their aims. The variety of archival footage, for example, showing how the first Japanese-Americans arrived in Manzanar and tried to make a living, is juxtaposed with the way these locations look now, with many of their gardens being dried up due to the groundwater having been drained. All in all, “Manzanar, Diverted” becomes an engaging and thoughtful plea for sustainability, but also the notion of acknowledging this part of America's history.
In conclusion, “Manzanar, Diverted: When Water Becomes Dust” is an informative and engaging documentary combining history, people's lives and a very current topic, the struggle for a more sustainable living and how we should be more mindful of our world's resources. Director Ann Kaneko combines archival footage and interviews with the present-day fights of residents from the area surrounding Manzanar, for their livelihood and their heritage.
