As a WWII history buff, I try to watch every WWII film I can find. This one was watchable, but for the informed it was more for comedic effect and an understanding of the racial prejudices of the time than for anything else.I don't even know where to start with this one but it plays to all of the boogeymen of the immediate pre and post Pearl Harbor attack with it's focus on subversion and sabotage when we later learned that even the Japanese themselves put little faith in the Japanese-Americans in Hawaii.Perhaps the most laughable aspect was the presentation of a SINGLE Japanese aircraft carrier as being capable of the destruction wrought at Pearl Harbor, when, in fact, it took SIX carriers and on top of that, they portrayed the carrier as operating completely ALONE, when nothing of the sort would've happened.There is also a scene in which the US Submarine remains on the surface with a single gunner dueling with the attacking Japanese plane when Navy doctrine would've had the sub crash diving upon detection of the incoming plane.All in all, there are simply too many factual errors to even believe that this film actually had a technical adviser... at least one who had ever gone to sea in anything bigger than a rowboat! The only misinformation missing from this film that I can see is that they didn't try to pin on the blame on FDR as many other crackpots did!

This is American exploitation at its worst, and in the case of this film, it ranks as a "Bomb" because it is exploiting a recent American tragedy with no well-meaning intentions whatsoever. The film actually starts off pretty good with a well filmed explosion sequence that destroys a pleasure cruise ship and puts three people aboard a lifeboat. The two men are quickly exterminated by the Japanese, and only Marguerite Chapman survives. A Japanese bomber plane sets out to fill her with holes but somehow she manages to hide from him by holding onto the side of the boat so she cannot be seen. An American submarine en-route to Hawaii rescues her, while the Japanese pilot is quickly punished in a shocking manner by his commanding officer. This leads to an exciting sequence where another Japanese pilot, wounded from being shot by the Americans, determinedly continues to drop bombs on the submarine, which has begun its descent to get out of harms way.Back in Hawaii, it's very clear that there are spies abound, because it's apparent that the driver of the car Chapman is in with her fiancé is being driven by is Japanese. This leads into a chase sequence near Pearl Harbor, which of course, is soon raided. What makes this scene really horrible is the manner in which a radio reporter reveals the devastation. Rather than sounding horrified or even rushed to get the news out, he sounds like he's introducing nominees at the Oscars. This is very off putting and is insulting to American intelligence, if that already hadn't been insulted by the fact that Chapman's fiancée was revealing military secrets in front of an obvious spy.The Japanese are presented in a very stereotypical manner, more interested in dying for honor than having really any sort of mission for why they were attacking America out of the blue. If you thought "Air Force" and "Destination Tokyo" (in addition to dozens of other propaganda films of the time) made the Japanese an extremely nasty enemies, then this one makes them purely evil without redemption. The film was obviously rushed together to take advantage of the timing (released only six months after Pearl Harbor!) and lacks any intelligence whatsoever. Columbia, which specialized in fast paced "B" films that were actually pretty enjoyable, really messed up by letting this one out. The first 20 minutes are promising, but the rest settles into disaster.

***SPOILER*** The film Subrmarine Raider" instead of making the Japanese look bad in their sneak attack on Peral Harbor on the morning of December 7,1941 makes them look far more effective then they actually were! Instead of having a major 100 fleet task force with some 300 to 500 warplanes carry out the dastardly and successful sneak attack they only have a dinky looking aircraft carrier with about two dozen Jap zeros to pull the whole thing off! Were also given in the movie the totally false assumptions that there was a major Jap fifth column on the Hawaiian islands who were secretly giving the Jap task force, via shortwave radio, the position of were the US Pacific fleet was stationed at in Pearl Harbor which then ended up for the most part sunk and destroyed in the Japanese sneak attack! It's odd that the main target of the Japanese attack on base the US navy aircraft carrier fleet was not only out to sea at the time of the attack but not but even noticed by the Japanese spies who were supposed to be tracking it!***SPOILERS*** Where the Japs screwed up according to the movie was in the aircraft carrier Hirnamu giving away its position to US attack submarine Sea Serpent by attacking a yacht that was in the vicinity. This bonehead attack on the harmless pleasure boat alerted the sub's captain Commander Charles Warren, John Howard, which eventually lead to the carrier being sent to the bottom of the Pacific! Something that never happened in real life!As for the Japs themselves they were so obnoxious and off-the-wall in their actions that it was a miracle that they could have ever pulled off the whole deal without their aircraft carrier being sent to the bottom together with its Keystone like Kop, or sailor, crew before it ever pulled out of Tokyo Bay!P.S I noticed that the film was released on June 4, 1942 the very day that a real and turning point battle took place in the far off Pacific that the US Navy really won. The Battle of Midway that turned the tide of battle in the Pacific Theater for the US. Not the phony baloney battle that took place in the movie with the sinking of the fictitious Japanses aircraft carrier Hiranamu!

This is probably the most important and factual Pearl Harbor movie ever made. Oliver Stone and James Cameron could not have painted a truer picture. The effects are magnificent, and the acting better than Ben Affleck in "Pearl Harbor" or Leo DiCaprio in "Titanic", if that could ever be possible. If you hold your nose, keep your eyes closed and sneeze real hard you will see colors and be dizzied by this masterpiece. A sequel was rumored to have been in the works, but was squelched by foreign powers. Some say it was the investment by offshore interests in Hollywood by means of arbitrage and loose lips. Others say the original cast was so overwrought with their original efforts that they could not perform again for years after, and were not able to be re-cast by new up-and-comers. Rumors will swirl for years, but the original film adds a great insight to future generations as to what it was all about.