Ôhinata-mura

It's a tiny , poor mountain village,where the people tend tiny plots of thin soil. They eke out a bare existence tending silkworms and burning charcoal, but it's not enough. The community has a huge debt they cannot pay, and the village manager resigns in despair. The new one has a plan: they will send half the village to Manchuria, where no one lives. There they will establish a new town; their old land will be sold, and anything over their share of the debt will be used to finance the new settlement. The remaining villagers will have enough farmland to make a living, and everyone will prosper.

It's set in 1936, and the hand of propaganda is heavy on this one, with occasional news stories about Chinese aggression against Japan in, well, China, people committing suicide so their relatives can go, and villagers cheering each other on with rousing banzais. It's more a sales pitch than a story film.