Thursday, September 08, 2005

Why We Fight 6: The Battle of China

US 1944. PC: 834th Signal Service Photographic Detachment, Special Services Division, U.S. Army. No personal credit titles in the film. [In charge of production: Frank Capra, with a mighty staff of film professionals]. A fine Imperial War Museum print. 63'. Viewed at Orion, Helsinki, 8 Sept 2005. This film was for me the biggest revelation of all in terms of historical information. It covers the Japanese aggression on China since 1931. It summarizes 4000 years of Chinese culture; how the divided country became a nation under the Japanese attack. Sun Yat-Sen the Chinese Lincoln. The Tanaka Plan: Manchuria, Shanghai, Jehol. Stunning animation on the Japanese strategy. Chiang Kai-Shek. The greatest mass migration ever recorded. Unforgettable epic images on the millions on the move. The air war. The Chinese armament. The Burma Road: breathtaking epic sequence. General Chennault's Flying Tigers. The course of the Yellow River changed (!). The Chinese guerrilla war. The great distances, the rivers, the marshes. The Tanaka Plan slowed down in China. Phase 3: the Pacific - phase 4: the US. Changsha, again a stunning animation. Madame Chiang Kai-Shek addressing the Congress. This Why We Fight film, the most criticized one, was for me the most precious one.

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