Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto (1884-1943) was the Japanese Naval commander who was given the order to attack Pearl Harbour, an order he was duty bound to obey which went against his own personal beliefs. While this infamous attack is a low point in Japanese and US history it wouldn’t have happened if the Japanese government had listened to Yamamoto in 1939 and searched for a more peaceful way to end their war campaign, proving his many ominous presages of the outcomes of the attack to come true.
Acting
Koji Yakusho's weary eyes carry whole scenes of silent resignation.
Direction
Narushima makes boardroom strategy sessions feel like psychological warfare.
Production
Painstaking period detail on the Yamato — they built that bridge for real.
Director
Izuru Narushima
Koji Yakusho
Isoroku Yamamoto
Hiroshi Abe
Yamaguchi Tamon
Akira Emoto
Yoneuchi
Hiroshi Tamaki
Toshikazu Shindo
Teruyuki Kagawa
Keikiyoshi Munakata
Bandō Mitsugorō X
Hori
Nobuko Miyamoto
Yamamoto's mother
Toshiro Yanagiba
Shigeyoshi Inoue
Rena Tanaka
Yoshie Kanzaki
Eisaku Yoshida
Yoshitake Miyake
Kippei Shiina
Kameto Kuroshima
Takeo Nakahara
Chuichi Nagumo
Trivia, insights & behind the scenes
The real Yamamoto never actually said the famous 'sleeping giant' line — it was invented for the 1970 film Tora! Tora! Tora! and became so iconic it's now treated as history.
In Japan, Yamamoto remains controversial: revered by some as a reluctant realist, criticized by others for still carrying out the attack despite his doubts.
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Reactions from the web
It's always nice to see WW2 from the Axis perspective. The history is written not just by the victors.
@EngPheniks 49
This film is way better than Midway
@zeldera 9
This was a good movie. Not sure how well it reflected the real Yamamoto, but as a pure cinema it is good.
@rsimko 34
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