A Crowd-pleasing Melodrama But Definitely Not A Masterpiece

Rating: 5/10 (2 March 2003)

Screenwriter Randall Wallace did it again. In 1995, he sentimentalized, melodramatized and generally dumbed up the historical accounts about William Wallace and wrote a rather mediocre script for the movie "Braveheart." He did it again for "Pearl Harbor." He twisted and warped well-documented historical accounts and ended up with a weak script, which has an annoyingly predictable story line. Moreover, the film clumsily climaxed right in the middle and kept on dragging on and on after that.
The only saving grace of this movie was its battle scenes. Unlike many other phony Hollywood war movies, the technical consultants of the movie amazed me with a great attention to details. Many of the replicas of Japanese naval planes were constructed with minute details. Most of the Zeros, Vals and Kates were painted very accurately in light gray or greenish camouflage. Some of the machine guns on these planes were constructed surprisingly accurately. (There was a slight inaccuracy in painting some of the Zeros greenish. Historically, all the Zeros, which participated in the attack on Pearl Harbor, were painted light gray.) Even though they were reproductions, the uniforms of the Japanese pilots (i.e. brown flight suits) and Japanese aircraft carrier crewmen (i.e. white outfits for enlisted men and black outfits for officers) were relatively accurate.

A scene of a meeting of Japanese naval staff in which several large models of U.S. battleships were placed in a pool was surprisingly accurate historically. According to an account written by a former member of the Imperial Japanese Naval staff, such a meeting did indeed take place in late 1941 at a Japanese naval base. During this meeting top members of Japanese naval staff and several admirals did indeed debate about the tactics of Pearl Harbor attack while experimenting with several models of U.S. warships, which were placed in a large pool. However, I am not sure if Admiral Yamamoto himself participated in this meeting.

The attack scenes on Pearl Harbor were filmed excellently. Even though the scenes in this movie were not as good as those in the 1970 movie `Tora, Tora, Tora,' the computer-generated animations were very well done. Also, the panic, pain and carnage at Pearl Harbor were depicted very well.

Japanese-American actor Mako played Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto very well. Just like Mako, Yamamoto was a short unremarkable looking man. In fact, Mako looked like the real Yamamoto more than late Toshiro Mifune, who played him in a 1976 war movie `Midway' and 1968 movie `Isoroku Yamamoto.' Another Japanese-American actor Cary Tagawa played Captain Genda very competently.

WARNING!!! POSSIBLE SPOILER. IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO READ THIS, GO TO THE POINT MARKED WITH ****** Unfortunately, there were many really disappointing things about this movie. The script of the film is very weak and clumsy. For instance, the movie climaxed with the attack on Pearl Harbor which happened right about the middle. The rest of the movie which led to the Doolittle's raid dragged on and on. Moreover, why did the movie end with Doolittle's raid? Even though this raid had some moral significance, this was a rather unsatisfactorily tame ending for this movie. Why didn't the director end this movie with the Battle of Midway, where the U.S. Navy did indeed spectacularly avenge the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor? The director did not have to portray the entire Battle of Midway. He only had to show the crucial scene in which U.S. dive bombers attack and destroy three Japanese aircraft carriers. That would have been a more satisfactory and spectacular ending to this movie.
The movie's central story line about the love of Capt. McCawley, his best friend Capt. Walker and the beautiful nurse Stewart was rather cliché and highly predictable. Similar story lines have been used by Hollywood dozens of times in the past. The story was so predictable that I could foresee the outcome hours before the ending. Couldn't Hollywood writers come up with something new? Also, why did McCawley and Walker, who were fighter pilots, participate in Doolittle's raid, an attack by medium bombers? I did not know that U.S. fighter pilots were cross-trained to fly bombers.

The scene of a meeting of top Japanese admirals and generals was so ridiculously portrayed that it became a laughing stock of some Japanese movie critics. With Japanese soldiers dressed in crisp uniform standing next to a banner with the slogan `Service to Our Country' exquisitely written in large Chinese characters, this scene looked convincing, but only superficially. Historically, no outdoor meeting like this ever took place. (In fact, top secret meetings anywhere in the world are rarely held outdoor due to security problems. Almost all top secret meetings are held indoor in secure meeting rooms.) Numerous meetings between top Japanese army and naval brasses did take place during 1940 and 1941. But they all took place at secure meeting rooms within the Army and Naval Ministry buildings in Tokyo.
Just like in many other Hollywood war movies, the enemy soldiers in this movie were total morons. Japanese soldiers captured McCawley and Walker but failed to search them for weapons--a very elementary battlefield procedure. While several Japanese soldiers were pointing their rifles at both McCawley and Walker, McCawley suddenly pulled out a Colt pistol and killed all the Japanese soldiers. Those mentally-retarded Japanese could not even hit McCawley once. In Hollywood movies, all Japanese and German soldiers are clumsy morons. If Japanese and Germans are so dumb, why did the U.S. lose so many men and women during WW II and spent almost four years to defeat them? I cannot figure out.
******* This movie is neither a great masterpiece nor a total flop. I agree with many people that `Tora, Tora, Tora' was a much better movie. `Pearl Harbor' was just a mediocre movie with good battle scenes and a very weak, cliché script.