It is doubtless a good thing that Michael Bay was not around in 1970. If he had been, "Tora! Tora! Tora!" might have ended up as a bloated three- hour epic about a love-triangle involving Admiral Yamamoto, Admiral Kimmel and Tokyo Rose, with the attack on Pearl Harbor tacked on as an afterthought.
Fortunately, he wasn't. The film we actually have takes a very different approach to that taken in Bay's "Pearl Harbor". There are no fictional love stories, indeed virtually no fictional characters at all. Rather, the film documents the Japanese preparations for the attack and the efforts of the Americans to understand what the Japanese were planning. The title (meaning Tiger! Tiger! Tiger!) is the Japanese code-word used to indicate a successful attack.
Although some well-known Hollywood names took part, including Martin Balsam, Joseph Cotten and Jason Robards, there are no real star parts; this is very much an ensemble cast. One thing that struck me was how little James Whitmore, who plays Admiral William F. Halsey, resembled Robert Mitchum, who played the same role in "Midway" from a few years later; neither actor, in fact, looked much like the real Halsey. Any actor playing a major wartime army commander such as Patton or Montgomery would no doubt be carefully made up to resemble the man he was playing, but naval commanders seem to have been much less well-known to the public than their military counterparts, so such realism was presumably thought unnecessary.
In many ways the film does not address the most interesting question about the attack, namely the question of why the Japanese leadership decided to take such a reckless gamble in the first place. Emperor Hirohito never appears, and General Tojo only appears briefly. The Japanese part of the film concentrates upon Admiral Yamamoto and his predecessor Admiral Yoshida, both of whom opposed war with the United States. It is implied that some Japanese leaders considered the Americans to be a spiritually corrupt, cowardly nation who would be unwilling to carry on fighting once their Pacific Fleet had been destroyed. It is also implied that the Japanese suspected the Americans of plotting an aggressive war against their country, especially after the Pacific Fleet was moved to Pearl Harbor from its normal base in San Diego, and therefore began planning a pre-emptive strike of their own. The film, however, never comes down definitively in favour of either explanation, possibly because it was an American–Japanese co-production and the Japanese film-makers might have been unwilling to explore their country's responsibility for the war in too much detail.
The film is more interesting when considering events from the American viewpoint. Contrary to popular opinion, the attack did not come as a complete surprise. The Americans suspected the possibility of a Japanese attack, having deciphered a key Japanese code which allowed them to read diplomatic communications. Remarkably, the Americans actually fired the first shots of the day when a U.S. destroyer sank a Japanese submarine trying to enter Pearl Harbor, but reports of this incident were not passed to senior commanders while more junior officers awaited official confirmation.
The film, in fact, tries to rehabilitate the reputations of Admiral Husband Kimmel (I wonder if Mrs Kimmel ever used to refer to "my husband Husband") and General Walter Short, the two officers who were made scapegoats for the disaster. The Americans certainly had enough information to anticipate the attack, but owing to a combination of incompetence and mischance this information was not passed to the two commanders on the ground until it was too late. Producer Darryl F. Zanuck" described the film as taking a "revisionist approach" which showed "what really happened on December 7, 1941".
None of the many individuals depicted here emerge as really interesting characters; I suspect that this is more a film for the military or history buff than for the general viewer. As such, however, it works very well, and the action scenes showing the attack are extremely realistic; the aerial dogfight sequences will bear comparison with those in "The Battle of Britain" from the previous year. I greatly prefer the sober, documentary approach taken by Zanuck and director Richard Fleischer to Bay's overblown, turgid love-story. 7/10
Fortunately, he wasn't. The film we actually have takes a very different approach to that taken in Bay's "Pearl Harbor". There are no fictional love stories, indeed virtually no fictional characters at all. Rather, the film documents the Japanese preparations for the attack and the efforts of the Americans to understand what the Japanese were planning. The title (meaning Tiger! Tiger! Tiger!) is the Japanese code-word used to indicate a successful attack.
Although some well-known Hollywood names took part, including Martin Balsam, Joseph Cotten and Jason Robards, there are no real star parts; this is very much an ensemble cast. One thing that struck me was how little James Whitmore, who plays Admiral William F. Halsey, resembled Robert Mitchum, who played the same role in "Midway" from a few years later; neither actor, in fact, looked much like the real Halsey. Any actor playing a major wartime army commander such as Patton or Montgomery would no doubt be carefully made up to resemble the man he was playing, but naval commanders seem to have been much less well-known to the public than their military counterparts, so such realism was presumably thought unnecessary.
In many ways the film does not address the most interesting question about the attack, namely the question of why the Japanese leadership decided to take such a reckless gamble in the first place. Emperor Hirohito never appears, and General Tojo only appears briefly. The Japanese part of the film concentrates upon Admiral Yamamoto and his predecessor Admiral Yoshida, both of whom opposed war with the United States. It is implied that some Japanese leaders considered the Americans to be a spiritually corrupt, cowardly nation who would be unwilling to carry on fighting once their Pacific Fleet had been destroyed. It is also implied that the Japanese suspected the Americans of plotting an aggressive war against their country, especially after the Pacific Fleet was moved to Pearl Harbor from its normal base in San Diego, and therefore began planning a pre-emptive strike of their own. The film, however, never comes down definitively in favour of either explanation, possibly because it was an American–Japanese co-production and the Japanese film-makers might have been unwilling to explore their country's responsibility for the war in too much detail.
The film is more interesting when considering events from the American viewpoint. Contrary to popular opinion, the attack did not come as a complete surprise. The Americans suspected the possibility of a Japanese attack, having deciphered a key Japanese code which allowed them to read diplomatic communications. Remarkably, the Americans actually fired the first shots of the day when a U.S. destroyer sank a Japanese submarine trying to enter Pearl Harbor, but reports of this incident were not passed to senior commanders while more junior officers awaited official confirmation.
The film, in fact, tries to rehabilitate the reputations of Admiral Husband Kimmel (I wonder if Mrs Kimmel ever used to refer to "my husband Husband") and General Walter Short, the two officers who were made scapegoats for the disaster. The Americans certainly had enough information to anticipate the attack, but owing to a combination of incompetence and mischance this information was not passed to the two commanders on the ground until it was too late. Producer Darryl F. Zanuck" described the film as taking a "revisionist approach" which showed "what really happened on December 7, 1941".
None of the many individuals depicted here emerge as really interesting characters; I suspect that this is more a film for the military or history buff than for the general viewer. As such, however, it works very well, and the action scenes showing the attack are extremely realistic; the aerial dogfight sequences will bear comparison with those in "The Battle of Britain" from the previous year. I greatly prefer the sober, documentary approach taken by Zanuck and director Richard Fleischer to Bay's overblown, turgid love-story. 7/10