"Nanking" is produced by HBO and Thinkfilm and directed by Bill Guttentag, Dan Sturman, and Elisabeth Bently. The film is dedicated to the memory of Iris Chang.
In 1997 Iris Chang dramatically brought back from collective amnesia one the most horrific events of the Second World War, the Rape of Nanking, with her book by the same title. It was immediately attacked by Japanese nationalists and apologists of Japan's war crimes in Asia and their American followers.
The movie is major indictment of the Japanese army's massacre of 200,000-300,000 men, women, and children, and the raping of more than 20,000 women/girls in 1937-38. The vintage newsreel footage has been excellently restored. The newsreel footage is interspersed with letters, excerpts from diaries and other accounts by German and American protectors (Rabe, Magee, Vautrin, and others) read by by W. Harrelson, M. Hemingway, R. Chao and others. In addition there are the very upsetting accounts by Chinese survivors of the massacre.
The graphic descriptions and pictures may make it inappropriate for secondary students. [PREVIEW BEFORE SHOWING]
In Japan Honda Katsuichi's book, "The Nanjing Massacre" (1999) has even more documentation of Japan's atrocities based on soldiers's diaries and letters and interviews, as well as wartime news reports. His book received the same reaction as Chang's book.
[Also see "Senso: the Japanese Remember the Pacific War" (1995). This a collection of letters to the Asahi Shimbun. See pages 59-98 "The China War" ...especially the acount of Ozaki Junko who as a young girl overheard ex-soldiers bragging about their rapes and murders of Chinese women in Nanking. pp75-76][Edit by="mwhittemore on May 1, 6:02:22 PM"][/Edit]
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