Unbroken movie

[ButteMT61]

Is it just me, or does anyone else find it distracting that everyone in the movie is so good looking?

No, you're not the only one. Not to mention that WWII soldiers/sailors being tortured and starving never once swear.
The movie is awful - read the book. Some things were well done - the CGI and the aging of the cast (including the wear on gear). But if you're at all interested in this subject, please read the book. It's the best thing I've read in years.

It's a Disney Channel version of a great story.

 

[havocpaul]

Funnily enough, I was just reading in the newspaper today that the Tokyo Board of Education has approved the removal of references to Japanese war-crimes from high school history textbooks.

That is a dangerous move, re-writing or white-washing history and denying the past leads to the rise of the same type of beliefs again. Japan should have been made to confront their war crimes in the same way Germany did and still does, for them denying the Holocaust is an offence. If indeed they have banned this film then they are being censored by those in power which is a sad and negative thing to see happening.

 

[handymike]

Meanwhile here in California, I was only recently made aware of the magnitude of Japanese American internment. If you're ever in Los Angeles, I highly recommend visiting the Japanese Cultural Museum to see the exhibit about what our Govenment "forgot" to teach in High School History

 

[Otter]

Meanwhile here in California, I was only recently made aware of the magnitude of Japanese American internment. If you're ever in Los Angeles, I highly recommend visiting the Japanese Cultural Museum to see the exhibit about what our Govenment "forgot" to teach in High School History

It is also worthwhile reading up on the 100th Infantry. Brave bunch of lads.

 

[Sloan1874]

No, you're not the only one. Not to mention that WWII soldiers/sailors being tortured and starving never once swear.
The movie is awful - read the book. Some things were well done - the CGI and the aging of the cast (including the wear on gear). But if you're at all interested in this subject, please read the book. It's the best thing I've read in years.

It's a Disney Channel version of a great story.

It does seem to suggest that two years in a prison camp was the route to sensible weight loss... There have been several shots at making the film in past - one during the 50s had Tony Curtis marked for the lead role!
I suspect it'll do not too badly in the Oscars because of everything Butte says - the Academy Award voters are generally advanced in age and like 'classic' films that do not stray too far into messy realism. A cleaned-up version of a Japanese war camp that focuses on the triumph of the human spirit in the face of unbearable odds is right up their street.
O'Connell is great though, and you should track down 71 to see his performance as a squaddie abandoned in IRA territory trying to get back to his barracks.

 

[ButteMT61]

It does seem to suggest that two years in a prison camp was the route to sensible weight loss... There have been several shots at making the film in past - one during the 50s had Tony Curtis marked for the lead role!
I suspect it'll do not too badly in the Oscars because of everything Butte says - the Academy Award voters are generally advanced in age and like 'classic' films that do not stray too far into messy realism. A cleaned-up version of a Japanese war camp that focuses on the triumph of the human spirit in the face of unbearable odds is right up their street.
O'Connell is great though, and you should track down 71 to see his performance as a squaddie abandoned in IRA territory trying to get back to his barracks.

The cast is excellent, Jolie sanitized it for Awards Consideration™, which is a shame.
Someone like Eastwood should have done it.

 

[Touchofevil]

Meanwhile here in California, I was only recently made aware of the magnitude of Japanese American internment. If you're ever in Los Angeles, I highly recommend visiting the Japanese Cultural Museum to see the exhibit about what our Govenment "forgot" to teach in High School History

That is strange because it was covered while I was in high school thirty plus years ago and is still covered up here in NoCal. Not only did we cover it in our history classes, but in our English classes as well.

 

[Monitor]

Is it just me, or does anyone else find it distracting that everyone in the movie is so good looking?

I would've been finding that distracting for the past fifteen years if I hadn't stopped watching movies that came out after circa 2002. I've no interest watching supermodels-turned-actors not acting in films made by TV commercial directors. Or worse, music video directors. Or even worse - actors.

But I lie, I've seen a few new movies. Made a mistake of seeing The Monuments Men. Still haven't fully recovered but at least it's good to know even Clooney himself tried to apologize for it.

 

[handymike]

I've heard good things about The Imitation Game.

 

[handymike]

That is strange because it was covered while I was in high school thirty plus years ago and is still covered up here in NoCal. Not only did we cover it in our history classes, but in our English classes as well.

I grew up in So Cal in the 80's and never heard much other than some Japanese were detained for suspicion.

 

[ButteMT61]

I've heard good things about The Imitation Game.

Excellent movie. I've watched it three times now. Also check Birdman & American Sniper.

 

[Fanch]

I think that many Westerners have a lack of understanding of the Japanese Code of Bushido, and the mindset or perception of shame from being captured as a prisoner of war, which was the reason that so many Japanese soldiers committed suicide rather than be taken prisoner.

“History is a set of lies agreed upon.” ― Napoléon Bonaparte.

 

[Big J]

Meanwhile here in California, I was only recently made aware of the magnitude of Japanese American internment. If you're ever in Los Angeles, I highly recommend visiting the Japanese Cultural Museum to see the exhibit about what our Govenment "forgot" to teach in High School History

I was taught about Japanese-American internment a lot more in school in the US than my kids here are taught about Unit 731, the 'comfort women' (sickening term), the Burma Railway (the Japanese brought one of those locos back, BTW, it's outside a shrine interning 1016 convicted war-criminals in Tokyo with a plaque that says it ran on a 'magnificent railroad constructed with excellent Japanese engineering'), the Nanking Massacre, etc. I was completely shocked when my daughter came home from elementary school one day with an English textbook with a chapter starting 'It was a bright sunny day when the Americans dropped the worlds first atom bomb on the peaceful city of Hiroshima'.

Most Japanese are disgusted (IMHO) by revisionism of the war, but the extreme right wing (although a tiny minority) are extremely vocal, have powerful friends (the minister for overseeing the police posed for photos with leader of a nazi group (that is on the police's 'watch list' for terrorist activities) on their website, and include genuine crazies who stab and shoot people and their families. TBH, even the Japanese police are scared of the right wing. I'd recommend the documentary 'Yasakuni' if you want to see just how totally mental these people are.

 

[Sloan1874]

Excellent movie. I've watched it three times now. Also check Birdman & American Sniper.

Whiplash is my tip!

 

[ButteMT61]

Whiplash is my tip!

Phenomenal too! Also forgot about The Theory of Everything. Eddie Redmayne is really superb as is Cumberbatch in Imitation (best name ever).

Probably need to move this thread to the movies section, but lots of good flicks last year.

 

[scotrace]

I've posted this before Seb, but I'll post it again. It's just my opinion, what do you think?

I think that in regards to Japanese obsession with US culture/vintage culture there are a number of factors at play here.

One that should not be over-looked is that it was a great era, after all, we don't call it the Golden Era for nothing! Here on this site, members have an active interest in the style, history, and culture of that era to some degree (and sometimes even all of the above!), but maybe for the vast majority of Americans, it's just something that they don't really think about very much, appreciate the significance of, and it's just something that is part 'of the background' of being an American (if at all). But I think that for US post war allies, the influence of US culture was maybe more massive than we appreciate (I'll come back to this, with regards to the Japanese below).

I think that for the Japanese, losing the war is the biggest cultural shock in living memory (maybe of all time). Lets not forget that wartime Japan was a fascist junta that told/brainwashed ordinary Japanese into believing a distorted version of bushido that prescribed that death was preferable to surrender, and that those who surrender deserve abuse and humiliation for not having the honor to die for the cause.

This ideology engendered as an essential requirement that ordinary Japanese must be prepared to die resisting US forces (never seen the picture of elementary school kids practicing with bamboo spears?) rather than surrendering, and that surrender would mean all sorts of abuse and degradation from the Americans (the Japanese army behaved pretty badly in China, and look at the way Allied POWs were treated- they were expecting to receive the same treatment from US forces).

But what actually happened? Well, whilst there are indeed accounts of misconduct by US occupation forces (every military has bad apples, right?), there was never an institutional system of abuse and degradation such as existed within the Japanese military in occupied lands. In fact, US forces generally treated the locals well during the occupation (I have a great occupation era US Army Japanese phrase book that reads like a beginners guide to tough guy Japanese).

During 1944/45 the air war on Japan burned this country to the ground, but more importantly, US submarines were sinking everything. The Japanese were eating belt leather, and the government was issuing advice on how to boil up saw-dust for human consumption. This was beyond dire. When the war finished, not only were the average Japanese not bullied, harassed, or victimized on the streets, but real food started flowing back into Japan. This kind of treatment must have been extremely jarring for the average Japanese given all the propaganda they had been subjected to.

Then, the Allies start stringing up the guys who not only put them through this misery and took away the lives of their sons/fathers/brothers, but change the constitution and give Japanese freedoms that they never had before (votes for women, for example, labor unions). For the average Japanese expecting to have become an American slave, this must have been a pleasant shock that caused them some deep reflection on the lies they had been told by their wartime leaders.

In this postwar ruin of a country, where everything had to be rebuilt from scratch (industry, schools, hospitals) for many years there was a strong backlash against a lot of Japanese culture since it was seen as part of the system that lied to them during the war. But, Hollywood was still functioning, and Japan was flooded with imported US movies, magazines, newsreels, and such during the occupation and beyond, and the Japanese lapped it up.

So, in a way, this Japanese interest in US culture is an outcome of Japanese society redefining itself in the aftermath of the total fail of it's fascist ideology, stems from a desire to understand who the invading Americans really are, and is a symbol of Japan's break with the past. It's a love letter to the US, in a way, and as dark and gray as any salaryman's life is, The American Dream means that he can be free at the weekend to ride his Harley, or sit outside a bar in his A-2 and smile at girls.

It's a testament to our humanity in occupation, and the extent to which Japanese society has turned it's back on imperial era ideology.

Your posts in this thread are a great read, Big J. Excellent outline.

We will all have to keep in mind that we have Japanese (located in Japan) Fedora Lounge members of long standing who we value and respect. I personally appreciate that this discussion has been balanced.

One aside: I learned about the Internment of Japanese Americans in school in the 70s. I don't think there has been a serious effort to whitewash that story here-- in fact, it is hard to see FDR come up in anything written these days without an inevitablele "sadly, his record is marred by the horrible decision to..." I think one must keep in mind that there were, indeed, active "fifth column" activities by all of the Axis powers during the war, here and everywhere they sought domination. Prior to the invasions of mid 1940, Hitler had spies, troops and informants deployed via tourism visitation visas in the nations on his hit list, quietly making things ready, and who were already in place to assist when the invasion hit. The U.S. government knew this, and treated it as a very real threat. Given the time, place, information at hand, and already-present and widespread fear of the Japanese long before WWII, one can understand the decision to round up Japanese Americans as possible spies. That doesn't excuse it, or diminish the indignities visited upon those pulled from their homes, but I think you have to judge people and decisions in context.

Back to the movie. Still haven't seen it, and very anxious to. The book was absolutely amazing. Laura Hillenbrand is one of the best living authors of our time.

 

[LizzieMaine]

One aside: I learned about the Internment of Japanese Americans in school in the 70s. I don't think there has been a serious effort to whitewash that story here-- in fact, it is hard to see FDR come up in anything written these days without an inevitablele "sadly, his record is marred by the horrible decision to..." I think one must keep in mind that there were, indeed, active "fifth column" activities by all of the Axis powers during the war, here and everywhere they sought domination. Prior to the invasions of mid 1940, Hitler had spies, troops and informants deployed via tourism visitation visas in the nations on his hit list, quietly making things ready, and who were already in place to assist when the invasion hit. The U.S. government knew this, and treated it as a very real threat. Given the time, place, information at hand, and already-present and widespread fear of the Japanese long before WWII, one can understand the decision to round up Japanese Americans as possible spies. That doesn't excuse it, or diminish the indignities visited upon those pulled from their homes, but I think you have to judge people and decisions in context.

Internment wasn't even whitewashed *then.* There were quite a number of people who rose up in loud criticism of the Exclusion Order -- even people like J. Edgar Hoover opposed it. But in addition to the factors mentioned above, one must also bear in mind that the Hearst press on the West Coast was pushing rabidly for removal of Japanese-Americans from the "exclusion zone" before the smoke had even cleared over Pearl Harbor -- greatly exaggerating the threat of espionage, whipping up angry public sentiment, and making any move other than exclusion politically untenable. California was no stranger to lynch mobs, and many people in the state government feared the consequences if something wasn't done. The sentiment at the time was that the exclusion was as much for the physical safety of the Japanese-American population as it was an anti-espionage precaution. This may be seen as rationalization from a 21st Century perspective, but in 1942, that perspective didn't exist.

What also goes often unmentioned is that some German-Americans and Italian-Americans were also relocated. There weren't as many of them, because the populations were far less concentrated in single areas, but camps for both ethnic groups did exist.

 

[Dumpster Diver]

The first Twenty minutes are easily the best In-bomber Action Sequence Ever filmed.

The rest is basically an hour long Beating with A Bamboo Pole in a Japanese POW Camp. Brutal.

 

[pawineguy]

Internment wasn't even whitewashed *then.* There were quite a number of people who rose up in loud criticism of the Exclusion Order -- even people like J. Edgar Hoover opposed it. But in addition to the factors mentioned above, one must also bear in mind that the Hearst press on the West Coast was pushing rabidly for removal of Japanese-Americans from the "exclusion zone" before the smoke had even cleared over Pearl Harbor -- greatly exaggerating the threat of espionage, whipping up angry public sentiment, and making any move other than exclusion politically untenable. California was no stranger to lynch mobs, and many people in the state government feared the consequences if something wasn't done. The sentiment at the time was that the exclusion was as much for the physical safety of the Japanese-American population as it was an anti-espionage precaution. This may be seen as rationalization from a 21st Century perspective, but in 1942, that perspective didn't exist.

What also goes often unmentioned is that some German-Americans and Italian-Americans were also relocated. There weren't as many of them, because the populations were far less concentrated in single areas, but camps for both ethnic groups did exist.

Roughly 14,500 German and Italians detained in the U.S., although most were nationals of those countries. Notably, Japanese-Americans in Hawaii were mostly spared.

 

[2wheelgrplr]

If I may...
I don't wish to be a pedant, but 'bushido' is fake. It all comes from a book written by Inazo Nitobe. He was born after the samurai class was eliminated by law in 1868/69 IIRC. In fact, he wrote the book whilst he was living in San Francisco in the early 1900's, where it was leapt upon by the English speaking world as some kind of deep insight into the Japanese, whilst the Japanese at the same time, leapt on it as an opportunity to instill (read 'brainwash') 'proper' non-western values into the average Japanese so that they wouldn't mind getting themselves killed to make rich Japanese industrialists richer.

Daayum!!! Big J telling it like it is! The above and more! I've practiced a bit of Budo arts, read most of the English language stuff on the subject and am glad never got around to read Nitobe, got ever more disinclined to read it when I heard similar comments as yours from other Budo folks. Thank you for sharing your knowledge on this and related subjects - most interesting.

Also, interesting stuff about Japanese troops' attitude towards suicide, banzai charges etc. in China vs. other theaters. My dad was an officer in the Indian Army (Gurkhas) and their regimental history is thick with stories of their predecessors facing off against this suicidal enemy in the jungles and hills of Northeast India and Burma. The officers mess was well stocked with captured Japanese swords, mortars and machine guns (type 92 & 96), as well as a host of muzzleloaders formerly belonging to unfriendly hillmen of the Northwestern frontier. Anyways, I digress ... gotta go watch Unbroken now.