Mishima seemed to be a person constantly trying to grasp (or become) his vision of ultimate beauty. Early in life, he saw beauty in women (Beauty chapter, weaved in with "The Temple of the Golden Pavilon"). Then he had sex, which made him realize true beauty didn't lie in women. Then he began to think that dying for a cause ("exploding like a firework") would be the only way he could reach this beauty. He was too cowardly, however, and didn't truly want to die. He then began to think that achieving a perfect body is the true form of beauty. Then finally, by training his army which he tried to make as pure as his art (by practicing samurai beliefs) and devising a plan to unite art and action, so that he could finally achieve "harmony of pen and sword", something he had always striven for.
The way the film is structured is utterly genius. It is a wholly unique film. It is obviously cut into four chapters (all of which I've just described), Beauty, Art, Action, and Harmony of Pen and Sword. The film delves into each of Mishima's attempts to find true beauty, showing his real life past in black and white, and dramatizations of his novels in vibrant color with extravagant stage-like sets and lighting, cutting both his life and segments from his novel together to show how his life mirrored his art and vice versa, and finally, cuts between the very end of his life in color, leading up to his final "harmony of pen and sword" through his impassioned speech after kidnapping a military general, before finally freeing himself through death. The structure of the film in four chapters also represents how Mishima himself viewed his life: as a constant struggle to transcend mere superficial and materialistic forms of art and to free himself from his constant search to find beauty (which included his own body and novels, which were both ways to attempt to find true beauty). The style of the film is perfect for the subject, and this is one of the only films I've seen which could truly tell the complete tale of the life of an eccentric genius, and show us how he thought. The urgency of the constant score of the film also fits perfectly with the urgency of Mishima's search for beauty and the urgency at which he wrote.
The way the film is structured is utterly genius. It is a wholly unique film. It is obviously cut into four chapters (all of which I've just described), Beauty, Art, Action, and Harmony of Pen and Sword. The film delves into each of Mishima's attempts to find true beauty, showing his real life past in black and white, and dramatizations of his novels in vibrant color with extravagant stage-like sets and lighting, cutting both his life and segments from his novel together to show how his life mirrored his art and vice versa, and finally, cuts between the very end of his life in color, leading up to his final "harmony of pen and sword" through his impassioned speech after kidnapping a military general, before finally freeing himself through death. The structure of the film in four chapters also represents how Mishima himself viewed his life: as a constant struggle to transcend mere superficial and materialistic forms of art and to free himself from his constant search to find beauty (which included his own body and novels, which were both ways to attempt to find true beauty). The style of the film is perfect for the subject, and this is one of the only films I've seen which could truly tell the complete tale of the life of an eccentric genius, and show us how he thought. The urgency of the constant score of the film also fits perfectly with the urgency of Mishima's search for beauty and the urgency at which he wrote.