Jimmy Murakami: Non Alien

Jimmy Murakami was eight years old when Japan attacked Pearl Harbour during World War II. Like many other Japanese- American citizens, the Murakami family was evacuated to the Tule Lake War Relocation Center, a concentration camp in the California desert. Considered a threat to national security, Jimmy’s family, along with many thousands of other internees, spent four years in the camp, where they suffered all kinds of deprivations and where his young sister Sumiko died of leukemia.

As an adult Jimmy embarked on a career in animation in the US and in 1971 found himself in Ireland where he enjoyed a long and illustrious career as an award-winning animator making such internationally acclaimed works as The Snowman and When the Wind Blows. In early retirement, Jimmy decided to return to the Tulke Lake period of his life by creating a series of haunting narrative paintings that illuminate his memories of interment. He also finally chose to return to Tule Lake Camp accompanied by his friend, documentarian Sé Merry Doyle. Doyle’s film documents the extraordinary life of a remarkable man.