Holy Mackerel! I've known of this movie forever, but got around to watching it only tonight. I started this review before I finished watching and I had already given it 10 stars.For the combat scenes, everything is thrown at the viewer as realistically as possible. There are no hokey miniatures nor restrictive sets. The destruction of a fighter during take-off is a masterpiece of practical effects. I'm trying to figure what kind of budget this movie had just for explosions. The merging of new footage of a 2-wheel touchdown and crash-landing of a bomber with real footage of the same was nearly seamless.Acting and dialog was top notch for 1970. (I'm a firm believer that both things were dramatically improved circa 1980.) Some of the dialog as a bit contrived but it was needed to push home some of the political and historical points.I gave this film a 10. It was an easy choice. "Tora! Tora! Tora!" will remain a must-see film for another generation or two. Pearl Harbor", as good as it was, lacks this film's staying power.

Let me first say that this is one of the most accurate war movies I've seen to date (and I've seen a lot). I'm a stickler for authenticity when it comes to historical pieces and I also believe that stories about the likes of Pearl Harbor and Titanic are interesting enough without inserting an unnecessary love story. That's where this movie shines. The attention to detail spent on recounting the minute by minute events leading to the attack let you see how the attack on Pearl Harbor occurred. Interestingly enough, where this movie "failed" is to a point where Michael Bay's version shined. NOT the love story part. But during the attack in Bay's version, he accompanies the attack with well placed scores that pull you into the gravity of the situation. In Tora! Tora! Tora! It's well..just an attack. Some movies do really well without scores backing them (Saving Private Ryan) but typically these movies have brilliant visuals and cinematography that circumvent the lack of music. This movie IMHO desperately needed something to bring you into the film. As great as the visuals were for 1970, I just didn't feel "apart" of the attack. I didn't feel anything. It just kind of happened and then it was kind of over. Even as the varying commanders came to realize their blunders, that just watched in stoic fashion. I think this movie is great. However I think far too much focus was put into being authentic that they forgot "we still need to make it entertaining" and simply put- it's not that entertaining. Interesting, but not entertaining if that makes sense. If you want action and sappy love stories watch Bay's version. If you want the detailed historically accurate version, watch Tora! Tora! Tora!

A dramatization of the Japanese attack on the US naval base at Pearl Harbor and the series of American blunders that allowed it to happen.The Japanese side was initially to be directed by Akira Kurosawa, who worked on script development and pre-production for two years. But after two weeks of shooting, he was replaced by Toshio Masuda and Kinji Fukasaku, who directed the Japanese sections. What would have been different? Roger Ebert felt that Tora! Tora! Tora! was "one of the deadest, dullest blockbusters ever made" and suffered from not having "some characters to identify with." In addition, he criticized the film for poor acting and special effects in his 1970 review. Vincent Canby, reviewer for The New York Times, was similarly unimpressed, noting the film was "nothing less than a $25-million irrelevancy." Now, I can see where Ebert and Canby are coming from. Indeed, it is long, and has no "main" character. From the point of view that movies are entertainment, this is not a good movie. But I think the film has somehow transcended that. I first saw it in school as a way to be introduced to Pearl Harbor and World War II. Did I fully comprehend what I saw? No. And is it 100% accurate? Probably not. But it still makes a great teaching aid and offers many jumping-off points.

A largely historically accurate account of the events leading up to the attack on Pearl Harbor and the attack itself, this is a very good film but it could have been an excellent one. Made by Fox, it was an attempt to emulate the success of its previous epic World War II film "The Longest Day" but it is not on the same level. My biggest criticism of the film is that it is slowly paced. It is too long at 2 hours and 28 minutes, particularly since the attack does not begin in earnest until 1 hour and 50 minutes into the film.The first hour and a quarter of the film, give or take, is very effective as we are shown both the Japanese planning the attack and the Americans' lack of preparation for it. These scenes are filled with a great sense of tension, foreboding and a terrible inevitability. The American sequences are very well directed by Richard Fleischer - as I said in my review of "Soylent Green", a master at maintaining tension - while the Japanese ones are handled equally well by Toshio Masuda and Kinji Fukasaku. After that, however, it becomes a bit of a drag until the planes actually arrive at Pearl Harbor. I didn't really feel that I needed to see multiple scenes of said planes or the Japanese fleet in the process of travelling to Hawaii. I don't think that they really added anything to the film, to be honest. The scenes of American mismanagement and bureaucracy prior to the attack were far more necessary to the plot but they were not done as well as were the similar scenes in "A Bridge Too Far". I liked the fact that the Japanese scenes, which comprise almost half the film, are actually performed in the relevant language as it gives the film a great sense of authenticity. I had never seen in a film wholly or partly in a non-European language before so that was interesting. Although there were too many flying scenes, they were nevertheless spectacular, as were the often deeply affecting battle scenes when the attack finally began.The best performance in the film is given by Sō Yamamura as Admiral Isokoru Yamamoto, the Commander-in-Chief of the Japanese Combined Fleet. He orders a preemptive strike on the US Pacific Fleet as he believes that destroying it represents the only serious prospect for victory. Even so, he does not share the optimism of senior Army figures and politicians who long for war with the United States. He is personally opposed to the war on the grounds that it would be disastrous for Japan. The Emperor Hirohito, who is not depicted in the film presumably because he was still alive and still reigning when it was made, has no desire for war either. However, they both find themselves on the losing side of the argument. Yamamura does an excellent job of depicting Yamamoto's conflict between his loyalty to his country and the realities of sound military strategy. Since I do not know a word of Japanese other than "tora" and "sayonara," I found that I paid more attention to his facial expressions than I usually do and they played a major role in conveying that conflict. At the end of the film, Yamamoto observes, "I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve." There is no evidence to suggest that he ever actually said this but it is difficult to disagree with the sentiment.On the English speaking side, the best performance is given by Martin Balsam as Yamamoto's American counterpart Admiral Husband E. Kimmel. He is depicted in the film as a good man and a competent commander whose ability to perform was severely constrained by the incompetence of others and bureaucracy. Kimmel is under severe pressure for much of the film but manages to keep a level head throughout. Ten days after the attack, he was relieved of his command and demoted. He retired in disgrace in 1942. Played well by Jason Robards, General Walter Short is treated less sympathetically in that he is depicted as an obstinate and often short-sighted man. He is shown to be more concerned with the risk of sabotage than outside attack. In a plan that backfired drastically, he orders that the planes be positioned in the middle of airfields so that they would be safe from sabotage. Unfortunately, he might as well have painted giant bullseyes on them.The most sympathetic characters in the film are perhaps Colonel Rufus Bratton and Commander Alwyn Kramer, played by Balsam's "12 Angry Men" co-star E.G. Marshall and Wesley Addy respectively. On the night of December 6, 1941, they make a valiant effort to alert the US authorities that an attack is imminent, having learned of it from decrypted Japanese messages. However, their warnings are not taken seriously until it is too late. The film also features great performances from Joseph Cotten as Henry L. Stimson, Eijiro Tono as Admiral Nagumo, James Whitmore as Admiral Halsey, Edward Andrews as Admiral Stark, Leon Ames as Frank Knox, Neville Brand as Lt. Kaminski and Takahiro Tamura as Mitsuo Fuchida, who led the attack. Fuchida is the only major character who was still alive when the film was made. After the war, he settled in the United States. I can't imagine that he went to see the film though.Overall, this is certainly a very enjoyable film but it never reaches the level that it should. It should have been edited more tightly as it is about half an hour too long. Still, it is the best film that I have seen on the subject of Pearl Harbor.