Apologies to the mods. I know this isn't strictly speaking about VaS but I figured there would be more interested people likely to see it on this forum rather than on the Off Topic forum.
Yamato is a new video release in Japan. I'm not sure if it's available outside Japan at the moment but for WWII naval buffs, it's a definite must-see. The version here has no subtitles and no dubbing features on the DVD, so if you order direct from Japan be aware of that.
The movie follows the lives of low-ranking sailors that operate the same anti-aircraft gun together as a team on board the Yamato (one of two super battleships built by the Japanese in WWII). You get a bit of a glimpse of life on board the ship and key events in the Pacific are quickly covered (including the death of Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto). The first major action sequences are in Leyte Gulf when the Yamato was strafed, bombed and torpedoed by American planes (and where the Musashi was sunk, the sister ship). The main thrust of the movie however, like a lot of Japanese war movies, is the crew coming to terms with what they know will be a suicidal final mission against American ships engaged in the occupation of Okinawa, their final farewells and then the last minutes of the crew as, one-by-one, they are killed by air attacks. The final sequences aren't as harrowing as Saving Private Ryan, but they leave nothing to the imagination either.
By Japanese standards this is a major motion picture and they spent a great deal of money reconstructing part of the Yamato on a 1:1 scale. I've tracked down this web page which has been set up by a Japanese guy with descriptions in English (which he has done a good job with, but a native speaker will find some of it a bid odd).
http://www.oshipee.com/omami/e-photo-yamatomovie-set.htm
The scale gives you an idea of how immense the ship was, with the crew training and washing the decks.
This is the official web page for the movie (99% Japanese I'm afraid, but you'll be able to see some trailers).
http://www.yamato-movie.jp/
It's interesting to see things from a Japanese perspective. In Private Ryan, for example (but same can be said for other war movies from Hollywood), the close ups are of Allied soldiers being wounded and killed and the enemy are shown somewhere in the distance. In Yamato this is reversed. It's the Japanese sailors watching their friends getting bits of their bodies blown off, screaming for one another and it's the American pilots that are depersonalised. You don't see the suffering or terror of downed US pilots crashing into the sea.
Anyway, from a visual perspective if nothing else, WWII fans will love this movie.
Cheers,
Eisho
Yamato is a new video release in Japan. I'm not sure if it's available outside Japan at the moment but for WWII naval buffs, it's a definite must-see. The version here has no subtitles and no dubbing features on the DVD, so if you order direct from Japan be aware of that.
The movie follows the lives of low-ranking sailors that operate the same anti-aircraft gun together as a team on board the Yamato (one of two super battleships built by the Japanese in WWII). You get a bit of a glimpse of life on board the ship and key events in the Pacific are quickly covered (including the death of Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto). The first major action sequences are in Leyte Gulf when the Yamato was strafed, bombed and torpedoed by American planes (and where the Musashi was sunk, the sister ship). The main thrust of the movie however, like a lot of Japanese war movies, is the crew coming to terms with what they know will be a suicidal final mission against American ships engaged in the occupation of Okinawa, their final farewells and then the last minutes of the crew as, one-by-one, they are killed by air attacks. The final sequences aren't as harrowing as Saving Private Ryan, but they leave nothing to the imagination either.
By Japanese standards this is a major motion picture and they spent a great deal of money reconstructing part of the Yamato on a 1:1 scale. I've tracked down this web page which has been set up by a Japanese guy with descriptions in English (which he has done a good job with, but a native speaker will find some of it a bid odd).
http://www.oshipee.com/omami/e-photo-yamatomovie-set.htm
The scale gives you an idea of how immense the ship was, with the crew training and washing the decks.
This is the official web page for the movie (99% Japanese I'm afraid, but you'll be able to see some trailers).
http://www.yamato-movie.jp/
It's interesting to see things from a Japanese perspective. In Private Ryan, for example (but same can be said for other war movies from Hollywood), the close ups are of Allied soldiers being wounded and killed and the enemy are shown somewhere in the distance. In Yamato this is reversed. It's the Japanese sailors watching their friends getting bits of their bodies blown off, screaming for one another and it's the American pilots that are depersonalised. You don't see the suffering or terror of downed US pilots crashing into the sea.
Anyway, from a visual perspective if nothing else, WWII fans will love this movie.
Cheers,
Eisho