Why can't "Unbroken" — Angelina Jolie's hit World War II drama — catch a break in Japan? There are presently no plans to release the film here in theaters, on DVD or online, even though it has a strong Japan focus as well as a major role for popular local rock musician Miyavi (whose real name is Takamasa Ishihara).
That focus, however, is on the tortures Miyavi's character — a sadistic internment camp guard — inflicts on the captured Louis Zamperini, a real-life U.S. bombardier hero played by Jack O'Connell. Based on Zamperini's war experiences — related in Laura Hillenbrand's best-selling 2010 book of the same name — "Unbroken" has been fiercely attacked by Japanese rightists. Hiromichi Moteki, secretary general of a group called the Society for the Dissemination of Historical Fact, told Britain's Telegraph newspaper that the film "has no credibility and is immoral."
All of this, however, is business as usual. Local rightists have been complaining about movies they consider anti-Japanese for decades. But several of those films had something "Unbroken" doesn't: a Japanese release date.
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