I was warned that this is a poor film. It was a box office bomb. But, I decided to see it anyway. Worse than I imagined!
As a one-time entomologist, I was interested in the silkworm aspects of the film. It's very unclear to me why Herve has to continuously return to Japan each winter to obtain more silkworm eggs. Why couldn't the French operation he worked for breed their own eggs?? Perhaps the Japanese had two strains of silkworms they crossed to give superior larva, like 'hybrid vigor' in corn? ........ Then, there is the problem of the eggs hatching on the long voyage home. This actually happened on Hevre's last trip, even while still in Japan. I assume he always went to Japan in the dead of winter to slow the development of the eggs. Apparently, he returned to France via Siberia in winter for the same reason. Nevermind that he would have frozen to death on such a long arduous trip. Also, the eggs would have died if they were, at any point, frozen in Japan or Siberia! What he really needed was a way to constantly maintain them at the temperature of a typical home refrigerator. According to one net source, they are viable after being kept in a fridge for 5 months. But, electric fridges hadn't yet been invented. Perhaps, a very well insulated ice chest on a ship would have sufficed, but probably the trip was too long for that to work.
From Baldebiou's comments, it's clear the disease his silkworms were suffering from was pebrine: the most common disease of silkworms. This is caused by a intracellular parasite, called a microsporidian, distantly related to primitive fungi. As Baldebiou mentions, in 1865, during a European-wide epidemic of this disease, Louis Pasteur discovered the causative organism, whose spores are visible under a light microscope. He found that if he separated the pairs of moths and examined them for these spores after they layed their eggs, if he saw spores in the female, he discarded her eggs, as the parasite was transmitted through her eggs. Thus, he could start a parasite-free colony. As personal note, I once observed such a parasite in my sluggish larvae I was mass rearing, and used the same method of ridding my colony of the disease, being unaware of Pasteur's seminal discovery.
Now, turning to the supposed romance between Herve and 'The Girl', from our viewpoint, they never spoke to each other, partly because of the language barrier and the very conservative nature of Japanese women of the time. They never even hugged or kissed. How could they fall in love with each other except in the most superficial way under these conditions. 'The Girl' remained very stiff throughout. Interestingly, instead of offering herself to Herve, 'The Girl' procured another girl to have sex with Hevre, presumably not wanting to compromise her relationship with her master.
The last time Herve goes to Japan, against the advice of Baldabiou, he finds the village he previously procured eggs from burned to the the ground. Presumably, this was due to the civil war that accompanied the famous Meiji restoration, that set Japan on the road to modernize its economy and culture.
As a one-time entomologist, I was interested in the silkworm aspects of the film. It's very unclear to me why Herve has to continuously return to Japan each winter to obtain more silkworm eggs. Why couldn't the French operation he worked for breed their own eggs?? Perhaps the Japanese had two strains of silkworms they crossed to give superior larva, like 'hybrid vigor' in corn? ........ Then, there is the problem of the eggs hatching on the long voyage home. This actually happened on Hevre's last trip, even while still in Japan. I assume he always went to Japan in the dead of winter to slow the development of the eggs. Apparently, he returned to France via Siberia in winter for the same reason. Nevermind that he would have frozen to death on such a long arduous trip. Also, the eggs would have died if they were, at any point, frozen in Japan or Siberia! What he really needed was a way to constantly maintain them at the temperature of a typical home refrigerator. According to one net source, they are viable after being kept in a fridge for 5 months. But, electric fridges hadn't yet been invented. Perhaps, a very well insulated ice chest on a ship would have sufficed, but probably the trip was too long for that to work.
From Baldebiou's comments, it's clear the disease his silkworms were suffering from was pebrine: the most common disease of silkworms. This is caused by a intracellular parasite, called a microsporidian, distantly related to primitive fungi. As Baldebiou mentions, in 1865, during a European-wide epidemic of this disease, Louis Pasteur discovered the causative organism, whose spores are visible under a light microscope. He found that if he separated the pairs of moths and examined them for these spores after they layed their eggs, if he saw spores in the female, he discarded her eggs, as the parasite was transmitted through her eggs. Thus, he could start a parasite-free colony. As personal note, I once observed such a parasite in my sluggish larvae I was mass rearing, and used the same method of ridding my colony of the disease, being unaware of Pasteur's seminal discovery.
Now, turning to the supposed romance between Herve and 'The Girl', from our viewpoint, they never spoke to each other, partly because of the language barrier and the very conservative nature of Japanese women of the time. They never even hugged or kissed. How could they fall in love with each other except in the most superficial way under these conditions. 'The Girl' remained very stiff throughout. Interestingly, instead of offering herself to Herve, 'The Girl' procured another girl to have sex with Hevre, presumably not wanting to compromise her relationship with her master.
The last time Herve goes to Japan, against the advice of Baldabiou, he finds the village he previously procured eggs from burned to the the ground. Presumably, this was due to the civil war that accompanied the famous Meiji restoration, that set Japan on the road to modernize its economy and culture.