Film about the Ashio Copper Mine Incident and Shozo Tanaka.

Set in the time of steam locomotives and covering a period of almost 30 years, this sensitive film tells the story of the wife of a railroad worker in the northern part of Japan. The ferocious local class restrictions work to keep her husband in his place, as does his lack of education.

The film depicts carnivalesque atmosphere summed up by the cry "Ei ja nai ka" ("Why not?") in Japan in 1867 and 1868 in the days leading to the Meiji Restoration. It examines the effects of the political and social upheaval of the time, and culminates in a revelrous march on the Tokyo Imperial Palace, which turns into a massacre. Characteristically, Imamura focuses not on the leaders of the country, but on characters in the lower classes and on the fringes of society.