Giovanni's Island

Giovanni's Island (ジョバンニの島, Joban'ni no Shima) is a 2014 Japanese animated historical drama film directed by Mizuho Nishikubo and produced by Production I.G and co-produced and presented by the Japan Association of Music Enterprises.

The story follows two brothers, Junpei and Kanta, who live on the island of Shikotan with their grandfather, a fisherman, and their father, the head of the firefighting force of the village.

The brothers' uncle, Hideo, asks Junpei to light signal fires at night so that he can make trips to the main island for rations as they are running low on rice.

Meanwhile, their father, Tatsuo, with the help of their school teacher, Sawako, secretly supplies the rest of the village with foodstuff from the Dawn Corps' emergency stores.

The four of them drive to a pillbox where they spend the night, but in the morning they spot Soviet soldiers who've managed to track them down, and Hideo runs ahead as a decoy while Sawako and the children make their escape.

When they first arrived, the two mixtures of Japanese and Soviet Union children did not intertwine well, but, with time, they ended up building relationships with another and even became friends at school and embraced one another's culture.

Giovanni's Island shows the importance of endurance and compassion both were valuable for Junpei and Kanta in friendship, with not judging an entire country based on its action, but instead, just the person themselves.

Giovanni shows the destiny of people forced in this world where violence lingers, war is inevitable and language is different, but even with all of these issues, the movie delivers a clear message that companionship and endurance through hard times can persevere.