Word: pearling
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Zenji Abe was a 25-year-old Zero pilot on his first mission when he attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941. He continued flying bombing raids until June 1944, when he was shot down and stranded on the Mariana Islands. On Sept. 2, 1945, he paddled a rubber raft to a U.S. ship offshore and signed his recognition of Japan's surrender...
...Many years later, Abe visited Pearl Harbor again, this time as part of a tour group. Today, retired from Japan's Self-Defense Force, he lives in a small apartment in Koganei, a suburb of Tokyo, his living room decorated with a small American flag and finger-sized replicas of Rhett Butler and Scarlett O'Hara. Recently, Abe shared his recollections...
...That explains the contorted strategy of marketing the film solely as a love story. Japanese billboards for Pearl Harbor insist it is just like Titanic, a colossal hit that raked in $225 million in Japan, whose film fans tend to love action-packed adventures with romantic leads. The trailer shown in Japan is vague about who the enemy actually is, cutting out close-ups of grim-faced Japanese soldiers heading off to bomb Hawaii that are shown in trailers elsewhere. A 14-page spread on the movie in the fan magazine Pia never even mentions Japan's involvement...
...Despite Disney's spin, Internet chat rooms reflect a certain hostility. Hundreds have joined a thread titled, Committee to Boycott Pearl Harbor. One contributor gripes: "They'll probably make a movie called Hiroshima next, in which heroic American soldiers bomb those evil Japanese and save the world." Another writes: "In Armageddon, you could excuse the message that America is number one because it's science fiction. But Pearl Harbor looks to be pure propaganda...
...Japanese war veterans, many of whom have endured vilification at home, the movie is digging up painful memories. "Pearl Harbor was so long ago," says Yuzo Fujita, 84, a onetime Zero pilot. "Why must they keep bringing it up?" Another former airman puts it this way: "When it comes to the war, we are always seen as bad. But bad things were committed on all sides. Think of all the people they killed in Hiroshima. I fear young people will see the movie and believe that's the way it happened...