APPENDIX B:
LIST OF MOVIES ABOUT THE PACIFIC WAR,
IN ALPHABETICAL ORDER
262
263
Across the Pacific (1942)
Directed by John Huston. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Mary Astor, Sidney
Greenstreet, Victor Sen Yung. Rick Leland, a tough, cynical Army officer, is
given a bogus dishonorable discharge and sent undercover to hook up with
Japanese sympathizers on the eve of Pearl Harbor. 96 min.
Attack! (1956)
Directed by Robert Aldrich. Cast: Jack Palance, Eddie Albert, Lee Marvin, Robert
Strauss, Richard Jaeckel, Buddy Ebsen. Reanactment of the Battle of the Bulge,
emphasizing a group of American soldiers led by cowardly Captain Cooney. 108
min.
Back to Bataan (1945)
Directed by Edward Dmytryk. Cast: John Wayne, Anthony Quinn, Beulah Bondi,
Richard Loo, Philip Ahn, Lawrence Tierney, Paul Fix, Abner Biberman, Vladimir
Sokoloff. After the fall of the Phillipines in WWII, colonel Joseph Maden of the
U.S. Army stays on to organize guerrilla fighters against the conquerors. 95 min.
Bataan (1943)
Director: Tay Garnett. A realistic motion picture written in a documentary style
about a small band of American soldiers who attempt to destroy a strategic bridge
during the Japanese invasion of the Philippines in 1942. 115 min.
Battle of Blood Island (1960)
Directed by Joel M. Rapp. Cast: Richard Devon, Ron Kennedy. Only two GI's
survive a Pacific Island battle during WWII and must learn to rely on each other
to evade the Japanese. 64 min.
Battle of the Bulge (1965)
Directed by Ken Annakin. Cast: Henry Fonda, Robert Shaw, Robert Ryan, Dana
Andrews, Pier Angeli, George Montgomery, Ty Hardin, Charles Bronson. In this
spectacular re-creation of a crucial campaign, Nazi Panzer forces stage a last-ditch
Belgian front offensive that could turn the tide of World War II. 167 min.
Black Dragons (1942)
Directed by William Nigh. Cast: Bela Lugosi, Joan Barclay, George Pembroke,
Clayton Moore. Following the outbreak of World War II, Japanese spies known
as "Black Dragons" ingeniously transformed by plastic surgery into doubles of
prominent American business leaders, use their disguises to cause sabotage, labor
unrest, and other measures to destroy the U.S. economy. The Nazi doctor who has
performed the surgery now bears a grudge against the Japanese, visits the fifth
columnists, and, after turning them into zombies, sadistically murders them. 61
min.
264
Blood on the Sun (1945)
Director: Frank Lloyd. Cast: James Cagney, Sylvia Sidney, Porter Hall, Wallace
Ford, Rosemary De Camp, Robert Armstrong, John Emery, Leonard Strong, John
Halloran. 94 min. An American newspaper editor working in pre-World War II
Japan tries to expose the menace of a Japanese militarist plan for world conquest.
Bridge on the River Kwai (UK / USA, 1957)
Director: David Lean. Cast: William Holden, Alec Guinness, Jack Hawkins,
Sessue Hayakawa, James Donald, Ann Sears, Geoffrey Horne. Captured by the
Japanese, British soldiers and their ranking officer, Colonel Nicholson are forced
to construct a strategic railroad bridge. Despite cruel treatment by the brutal
Colonel Saito, Nicholson displays unyielding courage and the bridge becomes a
matter of obsessive British pride to him. Meanwhile, the British High Command
has instructed a commando team to destroy the vital span. 161 min.
Burmese Harp (Biruma no tategoto) (1956)
Director: Kon Ichikawa. Following the actions of a young Japanese officer
separated from his battalion at the close of the Pacific War in Burma, the film
shows one man's journey from the comforts of companionship in adversity to a
solitary confrontation with, and the eventual grasp of, mass death in the name of
patriotism. 116 min.
Caine Mutiny (1954)
Director: Edward Dmytryk. Cast: Humphrey Bogart, Jose Ferrer, Van Johnson,
Fred MacMurray. Suspense builds during Naval trial proceedings against a young
lieutenant who relieved his captain of command of the destroyer-minesweeper
U.S.S. Caine at the height of a typhoon. 125 min.
The Cockpit (Japan, 1993)
Presents three animated tales of combat during the Second World War. In the first
story, directed by Kawajiri Yoshiaki, Seisoken kiryu (Stratospheric currents), an
ace German pilot must put aside his personal feelings for the sake of humanity
and fly into battle, guns blazing. In the second story, directed by Imanishi
Takashi, Onsoku dengekitai (Sonic thunder attack team), a kamikaze pilot has but
one goal - to guide his flying coffin into the enemy fleet. In the third story,
directed by Takahashi Ryosuke, Tetsu no ryukihei (Steel dragoon), a young boy
must brave enemy fire to complete his assignment and return to his comrades with
reinforcements. 90 min.
Destination Tokyo (1943)
Director: Delmer Daves. Cast: Cary Grant, John Garfield, Alan Hale, John
Ridgley, Dane Clark, Robert Hutton, John Forsythe, Tom Tully. Twenty-four
hours out of San Francisco, submarine captain Cassidy unseals his top-secret
orders and reads two fateful words: Destination Tokyo. This is a powerful and