A New Flying Tigers Movie Being Planned

[proton45]

That's cool. I don't watch too much Japanese cinema, or foreign films for that matter, so not sure what other countries are putting out. With today's PC-climate (not "personal computer"!!) here in the US, I can sooooo see someone getting tangled panties because we "portrayed the IJN as a brutal and barbaric machine". Someone would get offended. And there's NO way they could make something like that, keep it accurate, and slap a PG-13 rating on it.

Its just my opinion...but I think that much of the "white washing" you hear about is initiated by the Government (like the school board). What I wonder is, if the Japanese Government is trying to make military service an acceptable alternative for young people looking for a career. At the moment, a career in the military is very low on the list for intelligent young people. Also, Japan has been under increasing pressure from the USA to take on more military responsibility in their region of the world...put 2 and 2 together.

 

[proton45]

If it's not sympathetic to Japanese aggression and genocide in China, critics will call it "one sided" as they did of "The Great Raid".

What was the complaint for this movie? I don't remember people complaining about it...

Did some people complain about the depiction of the Japanese military?

 

[Vassili Zaitzev]

Wouldn't put it past some people Proton.

 

[Amsel]

I try not to worry too much about other peoples feelings, because they are irrelavent. Only peoples actions are relavent. The Japanese Military was incredibly brutal and if portrayed as brutal then it is in the right context. I feel cheated evry time someone tries to portray history in a fair way to not offend, even if its wrong. Some people are just straight up pansies, always worried about peoples feelings. Nobody truly gives a dang, so why bother revising history.

 

[vikingBerserker]

A-Fricken-Men!!!!

 

[RabidAlien]

I'll echo Viking. A-frikken-men. There are several BILLION people on this planet. Its not worth my time to go out of my way to please all of them, especially when they're not worried about pleasing me in return.

 

[proton45]

This thread has taken a strange turn (lol)... I was just wondering if their had been some type of campaign or public (press) release in regards to the movie's depiction of Japanese brutality, but that was before I realized that it was just speculation on what someone "could" say...

 

[RCB]

I think what some are trying to accomplish is to show that many people were soldiers fighting for their country. Most German soldiers were not Nazi's in the real sense of the word, but were lead into believing their cause was just, same with the Japanese militaries. It's not a new tale by any means, nor was it excluded to WWII. Not more than a decade later we had McCarthyism which smacked alarmingly of the nationalism that gave birth to NAZI Germany and the Imperial Japan of the early 20th century. As we have now come to grips with in hind sight is that there were many average people who were blinded by their government and lead about like cattle to do ill bidding. Doesn't make them innocent, but it's important to highlight and illustrate. I think film makers may sometimes go too far (like Bridge on the River Kwai)in that endeavour, but it certainly has its merits and reasons and hopefully film makers that pursue historical accuracy and those who want to produce a "heroic" film can find common ground and produce a movie that excites and delivers the messages of a world war that consumed millions and millions of lives. The problem with WWII movies is that the event was not fiction. Very very few people are evil for evil's sake. When you talk about a truly world changing portion of history you can't gloss over the atrocities or in my opinion, the most important lesson of blind faith in government and how it can lead to terrible consequences.

 

[JoeB]

Some good points being made on the thread, but a little hard to see what concrete thing the discussion is about. Some planned movie about the AVG, directed by John Woo. Well then clearly it will probably be (internationalized) Hollywood junk. And for all the commonly left-leaning political and social agenda's in Hollywood films, I'm not aware of too many if any glorifying the Japanese in WWII, or treating the American 'greatest generation' anything but reverently, sometimes unrealistically so.

Anyway how are Japanese atrocities really relevant to the AVG? The movie might shoehorn them in because Japan bashing is so popular in much of ex-Japan Asia, and somewhat in the US and Europe too. But all the AVG would have seen would be stuff like gunning pilots in their parachutes, and US air arms did that spontaneously themselves even in ETO, justified as harsh 'war is hell' practicality (enemy aviators allowed to parachute over their own territory would be back to fight again, the Germans weren't short of planes per se). Most memoirs of Americans in China in WWII AFAIK were mainly shocked by the barbaric treatment and punishments of Chinese by Chinese. They didn't generally come up against Japanese atrocities first hand.

Joe

 

[Amsel]

why would showing an imperialistic brutal Japanese military be considered bashing? They were brutal. They are not brutal now though. But once upon a time a couple of generations ago they were. They were brutal to themselves and everyone else. Samaraui stuff.
The AVG was around much of this brutality as they tried to stop the Japanese advance. Maybe not on the foot soldier level though. Alot of bad stuff was happening in the region that the AVG was based in and they moved their operations more then once due to the Japanese advance.

I can't blame the Japanese soldiers for being brutal because thats how they were treated by their superiors.

 

[syscom3]

JoeB, the world was well aware of what the Japanese had done in Nanjing. There is brutality, and then there is brutality taken to an extreme, that even the nazi representatives in China were shocked.

 

[JoeB]

I've done a lot of reading about not only Pacific War but Japan's war in China, so well familiar with it. Question would remain, what do Japanese atrocities specifically have to do with the AVG? and answer would be: not much. "Saving Private Ryan" didn't focus on Nazi war crimes per se (as opposed to the general brutality of the land battlefield on both sides), it wasn't relevant to the story; same for "Band of Brothers" miniseries except in the episode where it was actually relevant (concentration camp liberated by the 101st Airborne Div), to compare to other recent popularizations of WWII history in film and TV. In general it seems more people are able to separate military history from politics wrt European than Pacific theaters of WWII. The excuse offered for that is usually Japanese historical revisionism but that actually doesn't make much logical sense. Revisionism is still one topic, the AVG's campaigns another topic which has no more to do with revisionism about atrocities than it has to do with atrocities themselves: little if anything in either case. The AVG mostly fought in actions related to Japanese land operations in Burma, anyway, not so directly connected to the war in China proper.

Joe

 

[Amsel]

I agree that the AVG doesn't have a whole lot to do with atrocities and it wasn't my point anyways.

 

[RabidAlien]

Just another thread that got bent outta shape a tad. Happens on every forum. I think I helped contribute to this one, though. My bad!

No matter how badly done this one may be, I'll still see it! It can't be as bad as St. Anna, and I look forward to seein Boyington flyin tanked!

 

[proton45]

Time to "bend" this topic a little more (lol)...

Anybody got any thoughts on the new HBO series "The Pacific"? HBO: The Pacific

It looks to be by the same people that brought us "Band of Brothers"...that being Hanks Spielberg. I'm excited about it...check out the video clip.

 

[Amsel]

It should be top notch if they stick to the same formulas as Band of Brothers. I'm looking forward to it.