The Japanese raid on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 has been the subject of many famous films:
1953's "Troubled Souls", 1965's "Fire and Sea", 1970's "Tiger! tiger! tiger! and the 2001 blockbuster "Pearl Harbor".
A few months later, a more grand and tragic US-Japan sea-air (aircraft carrier) cluster war also inspired many film creations:
John Ford's classic documentary Battle of Midway in 1942, The Battle of Midway in 1976...
On November 8, the latest war film directed by Hollywood director Roland Emmerich and titled "Battle of Midway" will be released at the same time at home and overseas.
This is an epic war masterpiece that is rare on the big screen in recent years and will be recorded in film history.
The film begins with the attack on Pearl Harbor and then shows the June 1942 "Midway", the most critical battle in the history of World War II and the entire history of modern warfare in the world.
It also involved the Doolittle Raid and the Battle of the Coral Sea in May 1942.
Last week, a small-scale advance screening of geek movies was held, and the reaction from fans was quite strong:
△ The director parachuted into the scene of the geek movie group of "Decisive Battle of Midway"
The director spent 15 years collecting materials to recreate the key World War II in the Pacific... History is greatly restored, and even the looks of actors and real historical figures are very similar.
—— @ River Wind Twilight Snow
Not only are there magnificent war scenes, but also the nuanced portrayal of the impact of war on people, and even the complex inner world of combat commanders at that time was completely restored!
—— @ Heaven does not give birth to me fragmented
The movie was more exciting than I thought... The air battle picture gives people a majestic feeling, very imposing!
—— @Ding Cong Youth
A large number of first-point shots allow us to experience the hardships of pilots and the cruelty of war.
—— @Sun Rainstorm 777
Thank you to the director for presenting us with such an excellent war masterpiece!
—— @Xuan-Yuan-Liu-Bao
Immersive, shocking, satisfying – "Battle midway" deserves its title and creative lineup, and it doesn't disappoint us.
It is the most unmissable domestic cinema film in the whole of November!
<h1>Real history, real people</h1>
The matter of "Midway" has been broken open and crushed by countless people and analyzed to "capillaries";
But people still discuss it tirelessly, and can always continue to dig out new details - because it contains too many key things: strategy, choice, fate, national destiny...
Midway was one of the biggest and most important battles of World War II:
At that time, the Japanese army was at the peak of morale, the military strength was strong, and the naval battle "never lost";
After "Pearl Harbor", they intended to take advantage of the victory to pursue, and dispatched four heavy main aircraft carriers of "Flying Dragon", "Soryu", "Akagi" and "Kaga" at one time, with the intention of completely annihilating the US Pacific Combat Team and ending the battle;
Unexpectedly, the US military successfully deciphered the Japanese communication code, strategically deployed properly, and sank all four Japanese aircraft carriers at the cost of losing only one aircraft carrier, "Yorktown", to achieve a Jedi counterattack.
Since this war, the US military has completely reversed the passivity since the beginning of the war and restored the balance of sea power between the United States and Japan in the Pacific Theater;
Japan, on the other hand, lost its dominance since the beginning of the war and began to decline in the war until it finally collapsed.
Unlike Pearl Harbor, all the characters in Battle of Midway have historically authentic archetypes and identical names.
△ The starry cast is star-studded
The story begins with two American soldiers:
Lieutenant Colonel Dick Best , the pilot of the bomber squadron ( Ed Scrin , the English name of dick Best is a bit interesting ... ）；
Edwin Leyton (Patrick Wilson), an American intelligence officer who deciphers the Japanese code and accurately predicts that the Japanese will attack Midway;
As the plot progresses, we meet famous people in the history of World War II:
Admiral Chester Nimitz, commander-in-chief of the U.S. Pacific Fleet (Woody Harrison);
Admiral William" Captain Halsey (Dennis Quaid), who leads the aircraft carrier USS Enterprise;
Commander Jimmy Doolittle, as interpreted by Alan Eckhart, the commander of the "Tokyo Raid";
Bruno Gaido (Nick Jonas), an aviation soldier who was captured by the Japanese and would rather die than reveal information about the U.S. army;
There's also pilot Wade McCluskey (Luke Evans) and Lieutenant Eugene Lindsay (Darren Chris)...
The famous generals of the Japanese army and their unique military culture are also carefully presented in the film:
The infamous Commander-in-Chief of the Japanese Combined Fleet, Isoroku Yamamoto (Yoshiji Toyokawa), calm and arrogant;
The "hapless egg" admiral Takafumi Yamaguchi (Tadanobu Asano), who played a decisive role in the defeat at the Battle of Midway;
The film strives to restore the real "group portraits" of all parties involved in World War II, and even the role and contribution of Chinese to the Pacific theater of World War II are also mentioned in the film.
There are no fictional characters from The Battle of Midway or Pearl Harbor and their slightly cheesy love stories;
In the 2-hour and 18-minute Battle for Midway, the heroism of the sea battle and the real characters is always at the heart of it – the whole process is tightly paced and makes people grab a heart.
The director shared an anecdote in an interview; to make the film, he needed to persuade some officers to cooperate:
I had to communicate with the admirals and borrow their places to shoot...
At first he was dismissive and thought I was going to make a Hollywood love story; but when I told him that the movie was about pilot Dick Best, he suddenly changed his attitude and began to give his full support until the last moment of our shooting.
△ Real scene work photos
<h1>A massive air-sea general offensive</h1>
The large-scale battlefield may be the main expectation of the audience for the movie that is named "Midway".
Battle Midway has everything you want to see.
It offers a panoramic picture of the major battles from Pearl Harbor to Midway:
Air-to-air, air-to-sea, anti-submarine warfare, and intelligence warfare take turns;
Large-scale aircraft carriers, cruisers, carrier-based aircraft duels, the progress of the story has always maintained a shocking rhythm, fighters in the fleet saturated gun fire swooping kill;
Some of the "first-person perspective" strafing shots interspersed with them even give rise to the sense of presence and immersion that only shooters have.
Big scenes and big explosions throughout the film, the effects of burning planes and ships are delicate and realistic — don't forget that Emmerich is the director of the "Independence Day" series, "2012" and "The Day After Tomorrow" disaster film, which he is best at.
In addition to the shock of the scene, the film's strong sense of realism also comes from the reduction of all the props.
The U.S. Army's Hornet, Enterprise, and Yorktown in the film are all exactly matched and dimensionally restored according to the original version - the size of the flight deck is even the same.
Many of the weapons needed for the film have long since disappeared, so the crew restored the firing effect by looking at museum exhibits, looking for existing drawings, and imitating the recoil of the cannon fire with different gases.
In addition, the crew rebuilt two types of American fighters, the Dreadnought dive bomber and the Ravager bomber.
When you watch this film, you will be immersed in a strong visual stimulation the whole time, as if you have experienced a series of big battles.
<h1>"Disaster Movie Master" Emmerich</h1>
Roland Emmerich has been working on film for over 40 years.
The sixty-year-old director, who saw John Ford's documentary about the Battle of Midway twenty years ago, became interested in the great war in which the US military won the strong with the weak, and came up with the idea of making a film about the war between the United States and Japan during World War II.
I especially wanted to film the stories of the pilots of dive bombers.
Because each of them piloted a fighter plane to release bombs in the lowest places, killing and wounding enemy troops, they always wanted to film the stories of these very heroic pilot wars.
But pearl harbor, released worldwide in 2001, put the idea on hold, so he made another war film, The Patriot.
The idea of filming the Battle of Midway, I never gave up.
Emmerich began to plan the script and start research twenty years ago, and he hopes to bring the real history to the big screen, so that people in peacetime can cherish the hard-won world peace in their hearts after experiencing the cruelty of war.
Our predecessors, with their bloody sacrifices, in exchange for our happy life today, but today's young people are not necessarily familiar with these battle stories;
Without the forebears who fought in World War II, our world would have been very different.
There are too many hardships and people who have sacrificed for it, and their sacrifice is heavier than Tarzan.
He fully integrates the multi-perspective narrative that he has mastered in disaster films for many years into war films, and the scheduling of audience emotions reveals the sophistication of a commercial film master.
Emmerich answered the audience's questions about "why do you want to make a World War II film now?" at the screening event.
Nowadays we often forget the history of World War II, but film can serve as a living monument.
I hope to use this film to commemorate that battle and the ancestors who gave their blood and even their lives, and to pay tribute to all those who fought for peace in World War II.
△ The director answered questions from fans at the screening meeting
Serious war movies based on real stories and characters on the big screen are originally few, and there are even fewer mature and well-made ones.
This "Decisive Battle of Midway", from the story to the execution, is a rare and precious masterpiece on the big screen.
Released on November 8th, true movie fans, definitely not to be missed!