ばか! When Hollywood Gets It Wrong

Don't you love it when Hollywood gets it wrong? Sometimes we do, but other times there's just no excuse. We've covered a lot of movies here about World War II. Mostly from Japan where most are good, some not so good and always with a limited budget. But when Hollywood gets a film, their budgets run circles around Japanese film makers. So what am I bitching about? This photo seen here! In 2001's Pearl Harbor, Michael Bay had a budget of $140 Million Dollars. While some will argue whether the film was good or not and other will point out minor errors, yet no one has complained about the shot of the Imperial Japanese Fleet UNTIL NOW. With all the great CGI effects in this film you would think they would spend the money to get this one important shot right. Right? Oh who the fuck cares! This is America! No red blooded American still bitter about the Bombing of Pearl Harbor is going to care about the Japanese right? ちょっとちょっとまってください! To tell the truth, YES! Actually, you do not have to be a Japanophile or Nisei to appreciate accurate depictions of historical events in films depicting the Japanese.

If I were ordering shots like I would a hamburger, I'd have to say extra accuracy, hold the bitterness. You can't talk about Pearl Harbor in this country without someone throwing ancient rancor at you. As we have stated many times, we're not here to refight WWII. We're here to call things as we see them. As you can see from this actual photo of the IJN Carrier Kaga (that participated in the attack on Pearl Harbor) you can see from it's profile a small island tower and smoke stacks pointing downward. Now Compare to the top photo where you see a composite of a modern day US Navy Nimitz Class Carriers and Aegis Class Frigates. You think no one would notice? We sure did. While Michael Bay's Pearl Harbor has numerous historical goofs such as the painting of Zeros green which they did not do until 1943, this carelessness or lack of credit given to an informed audience just gets under my skin. You would think after all those great CGI shots of the Oklahoma and Arizona they could have taken the time out to get the Imperial Japanese Fleet right? Or did they just thought we wouldn't care? With their budget there was just no excuse. And while we'd like to debate Mako's portrayal Admiral Yamamoto, we'll leave that one for the real historians. While we found the movie somewhat entertaining, however these errors in depicting the Japanese fleet sink this film for us.

If you'd like to see a better depiction of the Japanese fleet on film either see Tora Tora Tora with Mifune Toshiro who looks more like Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto than Pearl Harbor's late  Mako (great actor - wrong role) or the recent Isoroku Yamamoto movie The Admiral. http://lasamurai.blogspot.com/2013/01/a-real-officer-and-movie-part-iv-admiral.html. Please enjoy!