Know Your Enemy: Japan
Know Your Enemy: Japan is an American World War II propaganda film about the war in the Pacific directed by Frank Capra, with additional direction by experimental documentary filmmaker Joris Ivens. The film, which was commissioned by the U.S. War Department, sought to educate American soldiers about Japan, its people, society and history, and its totalitarian militaristic government. However, the film never realized its full purpose because its completion was delayed by disputes between Hollywood and Washington, and the abrupt end of the Pacific War soon after the film's release in August 1945. The film's first public screening was in 1977 as part of a PBS special. Plot The film begins with a text preamble which states that the Japanese in America valiantly fought for America because they stood for values like "freedom" and "liberty" and in accordance with the preamble, the rest of the film does not portray all Japanese people as aggressors, it only portrays Japanese natives as aggressors. It goes on to describe the lives of the soldiers of the Imperial Japanese Army. This section of the film mainly focuses on the appearance and diet of the individual soldier, and as a result, it devotes much less