Recently I wanted the movie Unbroken on Netflix. I remember that when this movie first came out, it was controversial because in the original biography there are descriptions about the ritual acts of the Japanese Army. Although I thought this movie would be propaganda against Japan, I still decided to watch it for entertainment.
Well, from my point of view, this movie is OK in my political view. At least, it didn’t show the scenes where Japanese at POWs alive or experiments on them. Western POWs being treated badly is not new. Sure, I’m a right-wing conservative in Japan, but unlike some nationalists I naturally can’t believe Japan had a war in orderto liberate colonies.
In fact, I think this movie idealized Tokyo in 1944. It was made to seem like New York. People walking on the streets were in Kimono or suits and smiling. In 1944, the Japanese war machine had run out of fuel. It was impossible for people to afford that kind if standard of like at the time. Males mainly wore Kokumin-fuku and female civilians wore Monpe, and both of them were trying to save resources.
The tormentor character Watanabe played by actor MIYAVI was not a good choice, I think. First off all, he doesn’t even look Japanese. I thought he was just a random Asian-American actor because his English accent is pretty nice. Then I noticed his Japanese accent is native. After some research, he is actually a Japanese rock star whose father was a Korean immigrant. I think they shouldn’t let a guy who has such Korean drama style face to play one of the most notorious tormentors during the war.
To be honest, until I started to write this composition, I thought the whole story was just a fiction, even the end of the movie where it showed several historical photos. I read a lot of articles about this movie, and found out most of the story was true. I couldn’t believe there was a man who could have such marvelous experiences, won medals in the Berlin Olympics, was stranded in the ocean for 47 days, and survived the Japanese POW camp,