A very interesting film, Nanking tells a story that many westerners may not have ever heard which is a definite shame as it is certainly a story which needs to be heard by the world of the cruelty of war, especially circa 1938.While watching it you can tell the effort that went into preparing the information for a western viewer who will most likely be hearing this for the first time. For a viewer who is well educated of the events in Nanking - this film is certainly not for them and should be considered an introduction. Regardless of this, the film does a good job of delivering the information to the audience. Even though not all questions are answered, I feel that the film did this intentionally in order to entice the viewer to go away and do their own information - something which I agree with whole hardheartedly as if a documentary can keep a viewer's interest even after the film is over, they have done their job.However, while watching I cant help but feel that the film had a strong Anti-Japanese agenda (despite claims within the film and by the director of the contrary). The film makes itself out to be an anti- war film and not an anti-Japanese but I don't believe this is the case. This is especially clear towards the end where it points out that Japanese soldiers involved in Nanking are enshrined at Yasukuni shrine to this day where politicians often visit.I have visited Yasukuni shrine in Tokyo and it could not be a more peaceful place. Yasukuni shrine is important to Shinto - the religion of Japan. Enshrined at Yasukuni is the souls of everyone who died for the Emperor of Japan between the years of 1867–1951, the film makes extra effort to point out that this unfortunately includes Japanese war criminals. Something which isn't mentioned is another shine at Yasukuni called Chinreisha is dedicated to the souls of everyone who died in wars across the world - this includes the Chinese, British, Germans, US, etc. The shine also includes 3 monuments to all the dogs, carrier pigeons and horses who died in war. This isn't mentioned in the final part of the film. Changing the rules of the shrine to exclude those who committed war crimes would be rewriting both history and the Shinto religion.Regardless of this the film did a good job at delivering information for the most part. I have seen criticism of having the cast and that the film would've been better as more of a documentary style - and while I agree with this - I feel that the cast introduced people to the story well (even though I do agree Mariel Hemingway overacts). I have to take points off for reasons explained above however. Definitely do not watch if you're eating your dinner

This film is not easy to watch, and I would warn any squeamish or young viewers that the footage is difficult to fathom. The suffering shown and spoken about by survivors is unimaginable for a person living in the western world unless one has witnessed it before. This film is essential to understanding the restrictions that Japan faces to this day. It is also important history to preventing these things for our world's future. The difficult part is knowing that the Japanese did not restrict this treatment to the Chinese, Koreans also fell victim to the Japanese. This film emphasizes why it is important to take such accusations seriously when it comes to the wellbeing of other people. I think that it is important to understand also that Japan has changed so much since the time depicted in the film, that being said, I believe that it is wrong to generalize all Japanese people for the crimes of few. It is also important to understand that the Japanese people living in Japan at the time of this occupation were being fed extreme propaganda by the government and had no idea what was really happening, that is probably why many do not believe these things occurred in the name of their beloved country. My hope is that when you watch this film that you will be determined to not sit by and allow these types of monstrosities to happen without a fight like these brave westerners exemplified.

How does one visualize the diaries of unfilmed people who are no longer living? Bill Guttentag and Dan Sturman employ actors to read, as if in a playwrights' initiative, the records of the tortured souls buried by time and the formal writings of human history. At first, I thought the story was somehow cheapened by this technique, but upon reflection, I see the power of its subjectivity. As a freshman in high school, I saw a documentary in a history class about "The Rape of Nanking" in 1937, which truly stunned me with its depictions of the utmost brutality and heartless destruction that went on when the Japanese invaded. That was one thing. Another was seeing this film, which not only interweaves stock footage and photographs on par with those of the Holocaust, but features Chinese survivors who tell their stories, their overwhelmingly horrific stories. And as for the survivors who can't speak for themselves, actors speak their very words for them. In a sense, that is one of the more essential aspects of what actors do: Identify.It's not often that I connect on a personal level with historical accounts of atrocity. I hear of Jews, gays and gypsies being cooked alive, gassed, starved and other such things and I can only recognize the horror and be disturbed by indefensible fright and indescribable shock that I see in a victim's eyes, for instance. The story of Nanking from the mouths of these people seems to me like a whole new world of terror. It is thus evidenced that human beings are capable of the most unspeakable cruelty and insurmountable venom. Perhaps it's that German and Japanese culture have a history of thinking very uniformly, whereas Americans, in spite of how cruel and despicable we've been throughout our history, have a record of being torn by internal struggles. This documentary glimpses the other side of the coin: Are human beings capable of surviving their experience with the same unspeakable cruelty and insurmountable venom?Maybe the reason I felt at first as if the film was deterred by the artifice of actors could be because the most riveting moments are all interviews with real Chinese survivors. The most arresting moments by far are the unexpected interviews with Japanese who were in the army during the Sino Japanese War committing the atrocities. At least one of them chuckles at a recollection.

I've read several books on Nanking and what happened there. Clearly there were an appalling series of atrocities which the movie documents well.But what was the point of having a bunch of Hollywood actors reading these lines? That contributed nothing at all in terms of understanding. If anything, it produces a kind of jarring dissonance watching someone like Harrelson who wants to see the US walk away from Iraq and leave people to suffer the same fate as Nanking, presuming to lecture us through his character about how awful the Japanese were. Isn't this the same Hollywood batch that talks up three minutes of waterboarding as if it were in the same league as what happened at Nanking? Personally I wish they had just shut up and let the narrative proceed.The films of the era were superb, as were the individual stories and anecdotes told by participants, including the Japanese soldiers. The coverage is very one sided, with the Chinese given the upper hand, but then the real events explain much of that. But the producers might have pointed out that Chinese soldiers didn't exactly treat civilian populations with kid gloves either. That's the way wars are fought and won in the main; Nanking was simply a particularly egregious example.Some are claiming this is an "antiwar" movie. Those in favor of letting the world live under Japanese and Nazi Imperialism so that there are no more wartime atrocities are simply exchanging the faster agony of war to the slow agony of peace under dictatorship.It would be really great to see these Hollywood 'stars' in a documentary about self-congratulatory hypocrisy. They kind of stunk this one up. The film would have been better without them.