The US army’s 1944 offensive to capture the island of Peleliu from the Japanese resulted in thousands of casualties on both sides. Based on an extraordinary true story, Peleliu: Guernica of Paradise provides a harrowing, animated glimpse into the human cost of war.
Palau, 1944. Tamaru, a timid, aspiring manga artist, is among the many thousand Japanese soldiers tasked with defending the island of Peleliu from extensive American onslaught. When most of his company is wiped out in a doomed, last-stand mission, Tamaru and fellow survivors retreat deeper into the island, where they hold out for almost two years, unaware that the war has long ended.
Adapted from a serialised manga of the same name, Peleliu: Guernica of Paradise centres on incredible true events that transpired during and after the bloody Battle of Peleliu (1944). With its cute character design and vivid animation style, Goro Kuji’s feature debut softens the graphic brutality of combat without diluting any of its bleak reality.
Kuji’s film offers a heartrending look into the psychological toll of war, where pride, shame and a hardened survival instinct force human beings into a perpetual, self-imposed state of siege. A meta-anime that examines the mythmaking that underlies all war, Peleliu: Guernica of Paradise presents a resoundingly humanist work.
– Srikanth Srinivasan
Film details
- Country of production
- Japan
- Year
- 2025
- Festival edition
- IFFR 2026
- Length
- 105'
- Medium/Format
- DCP
