Uploaded on Jan 12, 2010 by Nuclear Vault
Department of War
Department of the Navy
Released by National Archives and Records Administration
December 7th (Long Version)
According to the Amazon.Com description: In 1943 John Ford gave the great cinematographer Gregg Toland (Citizen Kane, The Grapes of Wrath) an opportunity to direct his first film. What was intended to be a short documentary of the bombing of Pearl Harbor grew into a veritable epic, framed by a debate between Walter Huston’s Uncle Sam and Harry Davenport’s Mr. C on the true nature of the Pacific paradise. Hawaiian history, rah-rah patriotism, and arguments over the loyalty of the Japanese-American population are capped by a stunning re-creation of the battle so convincing that feature films borrowed footage from it for decades. Arch and dated, it’s a fascinating slice of history that until a few years ago was never seen by the public. Toland’s criticisms of the American Navy caused it to be withheld until Ford could cut the 82-minute feature into a half-hour short, removing the history and analysis and concentrating solely on the battle and the recovery.
TPTB hated it. Not the Propaganda Film they expected/wanted. LOL 😉
https://unwritten-record.blogs.archives.gov/2014/12/03/its-no-citizen-kane-legendary-cinematographer-gregg-toland-directs-december-7th/
Censorship[edit]
Started within days of the attack, the original film was 82 minutes long and asked some embarrassing questions, such as why there was no long-range reconnaissance and no short range air patrols. Further, the film had a lot of time devoted to the culture of the 160,000 Japanese-Americans in Hawaii and their response to the attack. For these reasons the long version of the film was censored for decades and the shorter 32-minute version released.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/December_7th_(film)
Japan attacked Hong Kong,Malaysia,Singapore same time as Pearl Harbor. Why did Japan want war with USA AND Britain?