I think Tora! Tora! Tora! is the best movie ever made about the Pearl Harbor attack - and by a considerable margin (especially when compared to "Pearl Harbor", which was total crap). It's documentary style never bothered me, although apparently left many other viewers cold. But it is historically very accurate (especially by Hollywood standards) - even most of the 'oh come on' scenes really happened (such as the band rushing to finish playing the "Star Spangled Banner" before running for cover, and the scene where the lady flight instructor finds herself in the middle of the Japanese formation). I took a vacation to Honolulu a few months ago, and a couple of my wife's family members joined us. One is a 30-something Swiss national who joined me for a day tour of Pearl Harbor. Due in part to his age and nationality, he didn't know much about the Pearl Harbor attack, so we watched Tora! Tora! Tora! the night before to educate him on the story.
As I recall, on it's original release Tora! Tora! Tora! didn't do well domestically (with many complaints about the slow pace and documentary style), but it did quite well in Japan (apparently they like it when their side wins
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Originally Posted by
VC10man
I forgot about Dunkirk. I downloaded it and it took me several weeks before I watched the whole film as it was so bad. There was no continuity at all and I couldn't empathise with the actors.
That mirrors my reaction to Dunkirk almost exactly - the non-linear story line drove me up a wall, and I found it hard to really care about most of the characters.