"Hollywood Says: The Bataan Death March=Good Cardio-Exercise
LIBERTAS
An anonymous tipster notifies me that Paul Verhoeven (Basic Instinct, Total Recall, Starship Troopers ) is going into production on a new film about Japanese General and war criminal Masaharu Homma - the man responsible for the Bataan Death march, the torture of American GIs, and the bombing of Manila after it was declared an open city.
Here’s how this film is being summarized on Film Bridge International:
Beast of Bataan
1945 Tokyo/Philippines. Four young military lawyers receive the least desirable assignment in the entire postwar occupation of Japan from Supreme Commander Douglas MacArthur - they are to represent a Japanese General who has been accused of being responsible for the notorious Bataan Death March.
At first they do their best to evade their new career-destroying assignment. Then they begin to discover that General Homma, known as the “Beast of Bataan,” is a good and honorable man who was not, in fact, involved with the crimes for which he was accused. But MacArthur, bears a secret grudge against Homma, who was the only Japanese officer to ever defeat him in battle.
The young American military lawyers endeavor to save Homma from his obvious fate. Fighting not only their own commanding officers but also Homma himself, who knows he is destined to die.
This is a story in which villains turn out to be heroes, heroes turn out to be villains, and a group of young soldiers, along with an imprisoned alleged war criminal, provide a lesson in courage.
I’m forced to assume that Hollywood is now descending into abject madness. General MacArthur is now the “villain,” war criminal Homma is the “good and honorable man.”
Of course, some liberal is going to write in to LIBERTAS and tell me that I don’t have a sufficiently ‘complex’ or ‘nuanced’ perspective on World War II, and that he’s looking forward to Verhoeven’s film clearing away the ‘propaganda’ that has thus far clouded American movies on that war. Fine. Keep repeating that as the straps on your straightjacket are tightened, by me, as the door to your padded room closes …
We’re going to track the progress of Mr. Verhoeven’s film here at LIBERTAS and see what sort of mischief we can cause him."
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