Rating: 
Summary: Moving Film About A Little Known Part of WWII History
Review: This move is about civilian women and their children who were imprisoned by the Japanese armed forces during World War II. This movie affected me quite powerfully because I had read the book that was used as source material. One of the female children who survived the prison camp lives here in New Jersey and administers a juvenile reform facility. In an interview in the local papers she described how she draws on her experience for perspective and how she tries to show her male, juvenile inmates how to adjust and succeed. I clipped out the article and keep it between pages of the book. My thoughts and feeling about the book and movie are too many and too complex for me to completely sort them out in a critical review. What I offer here is a very crude sample of my reaction. My focus here is more about the historical fact than about the art of the film. Whereas the book is terribly moving, the film is not quite, but it is worth seeing. Few people know that during World War II, the Japanese had at least two prison camps where western, civilian women were kept. One camp was in Burma and another in China. The women were the wives of various businessmen, government employees, groups of nuns and Protestant missionaries. They had stayed behind or were stranded when the war broke out. Many of the women had their children with them in the camps. They were from America, England, Australia, Germany and the Netherlands and other places. There were a few Oriental and mixed race women and children also. They tended to be the wives of diplomats or otherwise well connected to the wrong side.
It happened that one of the women prisoners in the camp in Borneo, Agnes Newton Keith, was a professional author. In the camp she secretly kept a diary, and when the war was over, she published a memoir, Three Came Home, describing her experiences. It is a magnificent piece of writing, a minor classic in English literature. The book, some letters, and interviews with survivors were the source material for Paradise Road. There have been three previous movies from this material. A movie titled, Three Came Home was made in 1950, and movies titled A Town Like Alice in 1956 and a remake in1981. In the film, the rivalry between the head of the camp and his subordinate are straight out of the book. As characterized in the book, a few of the Japanese are decent human beings, but on the whole, though, they come across as completely ignorant and amoral. They are young, dumb and don't want to be there. The head of the prison had studied in the United States for a few years. He had also read a book about Borneo that Ms. Keith had published before the war. This connection helped her to survive. In the movie, as compared to the book, the individual acts of brutality and torture against the women are exaggerated. One of the women was reported for smuggling, and she is tied up and forced to kneel over a sword for 24 hours. In the book, Three Came Home nothing like this happened. Smuggling items back and forth with the locals was a regular, ongoing activity. Interestingly, some of the younger nuns became the best smugglers. I can just see some young nun having the time of her life doing this! In the film, as you might expect, one of the Japanese guards tried to rape one of the women prisoners. That part of the story was inspired by an event in the book, but in the book it was actually an incompetent attempt at seduction on the part of the guard. The woman, Agnes Newton Keith herself, rebuffed him. It became a big deal because she reported the incident as a rape attempt to the Japanese head of the camp. The Japanese made a big stink about it; her accusation was considered an unthinkable affront to the honor of Japanese soldiers.
In the movie a number of women chose to become prostitutes rather than live in the camp. That never occurred in the book.
I don't have a problem with the film showing greatly exaggerated acts of brutality. The medium of film is very good at showing that sort of thing but not very good at showing the constant, day-after-day suffering from starvation for four years. So it balances out. Many died from malnutrition and disease. That is only alluded to in the movie. The one thing that stayed with me from the book was how much starvation Agnes Newton Keith was willing to suffer herself so that her son could eat a little more. That was not depicted. Her sacrifice was beyond heroic. The filmmakers focused on the adult woman only, which I think was wrong. With Agnes Newton Keith, probably the greatest amount of her mental energy and time was spent trying to acquire enough food for her son. I don't mean to be kind to the Japanese. Close to the women's camp was a camp where the male civilians were kept, as well as some military prisoners. They were beaten and tortured often.
The center point and main symbol of the movie was choral singing that the women organized among themselves. The choral singing in the movie is not in the book. In the book and the movie, there are a number of women with preposterous vanity. Most of these women were from well-off backgrounds. Many spent incredible amounts of time bemoaning the absence of men and the lack of cosmetics. Some spend hours upon hours thinking about what dress they would wear when they are liberated. In the camp cosmetics and dresses were bartered for various items. The women were optimistic. They knew that some day the Americans would arrive, and they did.
Within six weeks of the Japanese surrender, just about every Japanese officer from every prison camp was dead. They committed suicide, were executed as war criminals, or just disappeared. Ms. Keith relates an incident where, upon liberation, some Americans soldiers killed their former captors on the spot, with their bare hands. If you read the book, you would have to pity for them.
Rating: 
Summary: Glorious
Review: This movie captures the life and struggles of those women captured during World War II. The movie is heart-wrenching yet magnificent. I was encouraged by the independence and strength of these women(whom this movie portrays). When faced with quite possibly the harshest of conditions, they chose to make music. All women should view this movie and strive to match their determination and patriotism.
Rating:
Summary: What a movie!
Review: This movie is must see if you are at all interested in the true story that it is based on. It is about a group of women that are held in a Japanese camp during the second world war. They start to form a voice orchestra to keep themselves happy and eventually overcome hardship. It is a fabulous film ...I 've seen it about 10 times.
Rating:
Summary: AMAZING
Review: This movie was awesome!!! At first I was reluctant to watch it but my girlfriend forced me to. If it wasn't for her I never would have seen it.
Rating:
Summary: Great movie..not sugar-coated like a lot of war films
Review: This was one of the best films depecting what the Japanese put women through in their camps. I know several persons, men and women, who were held by the Japanese in WWII, and the horror stories they tell are as bad as any of the German holocost stories. The acting was great, the pain believable, and the story true. Thanks to all involved with the making of this movie for telling this story.
Rating:
Summary: what a great Film
Review: This was one of the most moving films I have ever seen, the acting is superb and the whole production is just amazing. I can not understand why this film did not do as well as it sould, but that just tells us about the society we live in.
Rating:
Summary: a viewer
Review: though certain scenes could be done better, a very moving movie overall. will recommend to friends.
Rating:
Summary: Wish I Could Like It More
Review: When given a good script, Bruce Beresford is a fine director--witness "Breaker Morant" and "Driving Miss Daisy." When saddled with a mediocre script, even one he wrote himself, his films suffer, despite their excellent cinematography and earnest acting. "Paradise Road" falls into the latter category, which is a shame because it has much going for it. Glenn Close leads a band of familiar faces, including Cate Blanchett and a strangely Dracula-like Frances McDormand, all prisoners of the Japanese on a remote island during WWII. The women face the usual hardships--loneliness, starvation, disease, torture--while spiritedly resisting the efforts of the evil Japanese to squash their resolve, which includes forming a vocal orchestra that beautifully performs some of my favorite pieces ("Bolero"; "Danny Boy"). Chances are, though, you've seen it all before in one form or another. The well-intentioned performances range from caricature (McDormand) to please-send-me-my-Oscar (Close), though we never get to the know their characters all that deeply, even with the theatrics. The Japanese characters suffer more, as they're stock types from every WWII movie you've ever seen, with a "Bridge on the River Kwai" wannabe commandant (Sab Shimono), the sympathetic, but immasculated go-between (David Chung) and the requisite sadist (Stan Egi). In fact, it's hard to watch the film without seeing echoes of "yellow horde" paranoia, as this spitfire group of white women ably thwart the best efforts of a race of villainous little men. Unlike "Shindler's List" or "Sophie's Choice," which at least tried to explore the nature of the captors, "Paradise Road" is content that they are simply villains or, at best, misled, missing golden opportunities to take the plot to higher levels. Despite some moving scenes--a camp concert and the gruesome death of a sympathetic secondary character among them--the film falls short of its potential dramatically, true story or not.
Rating:
Summary: A wonderful movie
Review: Yeah, sure, it's a chick flick, but still, it's a GREAT movie. Hey, Jane Austin's books are considered "chick novels" but make them no less great literature! The story is excellent and inspiringly, and acting great, and the people will probably remind of someone who know. The story reminds of us something we seem to skim over in history class, the Japanese really WERE horrible to their prisoners. No Hogan's Heros here, just plain cruelty that slaps you in the face. Screw Leonard, it's WWII movie, what do you expect? "Maybe, for a change of plot, the Japanese will win in this flick." How much unpredictability do you want?!
|
