Behind the Rising Sun Reviews

A slam-bang, flag-waving, anti-Japanese movie released at the nadir of WW II, BEHIND THE RISING SUN served to rally moviegoers to the War Bond effort that was promoted in every theater. Director Edward Dmytryk and screenwriter Emmet Lavery (who teamed earlier on RKO's highly successful HITLER'S CHILDREN) tell the story of a Japanese publisher (J. Carrol Naish) who becomes minister of propaganda and forces his Cornell-educated son, Taro (Tom Neal), to join the Japanese Army against his will. Taro is brainwashed by Japanese ideology, and eventually becomes a devoted nationalist whose naming of names disgusts even his own father. The picture today seems pure and simple US nationalism, but at the time of its making it stirred a lot of hearts and minds. There's also the ludicrous casting of Margo, Neal, Naish, and Mike Mazurki as Asians.