Empire of the Sun (1987)
- Nominated for 6 Oscars
- 13 wins & 17 nominations total
Videos1
Trailer 1:39
Watch Empire of the Sun
Photos353
Top cast
Christian Bale
John Malkovich
Miranda Richardson
- Mrs. Victor
Nigel Havers
- Dr. Rawlins
Joe Pantoliano
- Frank Demarest
Leslie Phillips
- Maxton
Masatô Ibu
- Sgt.
Nagata
- (as Masato Ibu)
Emily Richard
- Jim’s Mother
Rupert Frazer
- Jim’s Father
Peter Gale
- Mr. Victor
Takatarô Kataoka
- Kamikaze Boy Pilot
- (as Takatoro Kataoka)
Ben Stiller
- Dainty
David Neidorf
- Tiptree
Ralph Seymour
Robert Stephens
- Mr.
Lockwood
Naishe Zhai
- Yang
- (as Zhai Nai She)
Guts Ishimatsu
- Sgt. Uchida
Emma Piper
- Amy Matthews
-
- Steven Spielberg
-
- Tom Stoppard(screenplay by)
- J.G. Ballard(based on the novel by)
- Menno Meyjes(uncredited)
- All cast & crew
- Production, box office & more at IMDbPro
More like this
The Color Purple
Amistad
Munich
War Horse
The Sugarland Express
Close Encounters of the Third Kind
A.
I. Artificial Intelligence
Lincoln
Always
Bridge of Spies
1941
The Thin Red Line
Storyline
Did you know
- Connections
Featured in At the Movies: Wall Street/Throw Momma from the Train/Broadcast News/Empire of the Sun (1987)
User reviews382
Review
Featured review
Another Wonderful Spielberg Creation
it was one of those movies i never expected to watch. it was late, i was bored, and i happened to stumble upon a channel i barely ever watch. and while i sat watching events unfold in front of me, i slowly forgot about my usual program of interest. there is something about this film that truly captivates you and leaves your eyes glued to it every second. Christian bale displays his talents wonderfully in this movie, and the most striking thing to me was his ability to give such a realistic, yet youthful performance.
his subtle acts of defiance against authority, his brave expeditions that left older men in awe, the fact that a little boy could irritate a general so much. friendships were forged, even with the enemy and it was by far one of the most astounding movies i’ve ever seen. it’s long, it’s good, and if you haven’t seen it — do so.
helpful•84
33
- slayer_5_By_5
- Nov 13, 2004
-
Why did the Japanese soldiers order the Brits to start carrying the white rocks up the embankment?
-
Why did the Japanese troops smash the windows in the prisoner barracks? Why did Nagata beat Dr Rawlins & suddenly stop?
-
Why did Nagata suddenly become enraged in Basie’s corner of the barracks?
Details
- Release date
- December 25, 1987 (United States)
-
- United States
-
- Official Facebook
-
- English
- Japanese
- Mandarin
- Shanghainese
- Also known as
- Cesarstvo sonca
- Filming locations
- Trebujena, Cádiz, Andalucía, Spain
- Production companies
- Amblin Entertainment
- Warner Bros.
- See more company credits at IMDbPro
Box office
-
- $35,000,000 (estimated)
-
- $22,238,696
-
- $1,314,509
- Dec 13, 1987
-
- $22,238,696
See detailed box office info on IMDbPro
Technical specs
-
2 hours 33 minutes
Related news
Contribute to this page
Suggest an edit or add missing content
Top Gap
By what name was Empire of the Sun (1987) officially released in India in English?
Answer
Empire of the Sun (1987) — Plot Summary
Edit
Empire of the Sun
(1987)
Jump to:
- Summaries (5)
- Synopsis (1)
Summaries
-
A young English boy struggles to survive under Japanese occupation of China during World War II.
-
Based on J. G. Ballard’s autobiographical novel, tells the story of a boy, James Graham, whose privileged life is upturned by the Japanese invasion of Shanghai, December 8, 1941. Separated from his parents, he is eventually captured, and taken to Soo Chow confinement camp, next to a captured Chinese airfield. Amidst the sickness and food shortages in the camp, Jim attempts to reconstruct his former life, all the while bringing spirit and dignity to those around him.
—Jeff Hansen <[email protected]>
-
1941. The Japanese are occupying much of China in the Sino-Japanese War. Diplomatic security protects the International Settlement in Shanghai, the many westerners there still leading a very comfortable, western-styled life. Twelve year old Briton Jamie Graham, the son of a mill owner, has lived his entire life in the International Settlement, that life one of wealth and privilege.
As such, Jamie, an airplane aficionado, is a spoiled child, who has not even learned Chinese, expecting any natives with who he deals, including the household domestics, to speak English. That comfortable life changes with the Japanese entry into WWII through the attack at Pearl Harbor. Simultaneously, the Japanese overtake the Settlement, including all its private property, forcing its western residents to evacuate immediately. It is through Jamie’s self-absorption that he becomes separated from his parents during the evacuation, he, now alone, needing to fend for himself for the first time in his life. It is during this time if Jamie will grow up and learn to live within the new tenuous situation that he will either live or die, life which he hopes will mean eventually being reunited with his parents sometime down the road.—Huggo
-
Jamie Graham, a privileged English boy, is living in Shanghai when the Japanese invade and force all foreigners into prison camps.
Jamie is captured with an American sailor named Basie, who looks out for him while they are in the camp together. Even though he is separated from his parents and in a hostile environment, Jamie maintains his dignity and youthful spirits, providing a beacon of hope for the others held captive with him. -
An aristocratic British youth is separated from his family at the start of World War II after the Japanese Army invades British controlled areas of China. Reduced to living on the street and fighting for food, the youth is eventually interned in a Japanese POW camp for British civilians. Here, admiration quickly develops both for captured American pilots and the Japanese themselves. When the war ends, the boy torn from everything he knew attempts to again find his parents.
—Anthony Hughes <[email protected]>
Spoilers
The synopsis below may give away important plot points.
Synopsis
- The story begins in 1941, just prior to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Jamie Graham is a precocious and privileged boy living with his parents in Shanghai. His father is a rich British businessman and the family lives in a mansion on the outskirts of the city and Jamie attends an exclusive prep school. Much has been done to shelter Jamie from the Chinese culture that surrounds him and he is quite spoiled, treating the family’s servants with utmost disrespect. Very interested in aviation, Jamie harbors an interest in one day joining the Japanese air force, a dream that his father finds disturbing.
The family attends a costume ball thrown by one of the father’s business associates, Mr. Maxton. While there, Jamie runs off to fly his wooden glider. He finds the wrecked fuselage of a fighter plane near an abandoned airfield. While he plays with the controls, his glider slips out of sight behind a mound. He scrambles up the mound and finds an encampment of Japanese soldiers.
While he stares at them, his father and Maxton appear and call him down, specifically telling Jamie not to run. As they walk away and the Japanese soldiers return to their camp, Jamie remarks that they «seem to be waiting for something to happen». Maxton suggests that Graham take his family to their apartment in the city and seek an exit from Shanghai, most likely by sea.The family returns to their Shanghai apartment. Early the next morning, Jamie spots a Japanese warship in the harbor communicating with land forces using flashing lights. Jamie begins using his own flashlight from his room when an explosion throws him back from his window. The Japanese move into the city in full force. Jamie’s family is able to make it to their limousine but are unable to get very far due to the crowds of people filling the streets. They exit the limo and find themselves crushed and separated among the crowd. Jamie’s mother manages to hold on to Jamie when separated from her husband but Jamie lets go of her hand when he drops his toy plane.
He sees his mother being helplessly pushed away and she bids him to return to their mansion. Shortly after Jamie witnesses fighting between the Chinese resistance and the Japanese army, seeing a man die in front of him for the first time. The resistance fighters are quickly found and killed.Jamie arrives home to find the house empty. He sees signs of a struggle in his parents bedroom, perhaps indicating that his mother was taken from the house by force. He hears noise downstairs and finds the maid of the house with the other Chinese servant, stealing furniture. When Jamie demands to know what they’re doing, the servant, whom Jim had treated badly over the years, calmly walks over and slaps his face and leaves.
Jamie stays in the house several months (indicated by the falling level of water in the swimming pool), eating whatever food he can find. When his food and water run out, he rides his bike back to Shanghai to find that the Japanese have long since cemented their control of the city.
Jamie tries to surrender to a passing battalion of marching soldiers but they ignore him and his bike is stolen. A homeless Chinese boy notices Jamie and tries to call him over. Jamie refuses and runs through the streets and back alleys, people ignoring his cries for help. The Chinese boy catches and beats him, taking whatever Jamie has on him. Jamie manages to break free and runs into the street, nearly being hit by a truck. The truck’s driver, Frank, scares Jamie’s tormentor off and takes Jamie with him to an abandoned freighter where Frank’s friend, Basie, is cooking rice. Basie deftly searches Jamie for anything of value, taking Jamie’s aviator sunglasses and a British crown coin he’d found in the swimming pool. He also gives Jamie a new name, «Jim» and coldly serves Jamie Frank’s share of the rice he’d made.The next day Frank and Basie set about trying to «sell» Jim to anyone who needs a manual laborer. When they’re unable to sell Jim they decide to leave him to the streets as an orphan.
Jim pleads with them to let him stay, even offering them the pickings of rich houses in his old neighborhood outside the city. The three travel to Jim’s old house where the lights are on and music, Jim’s mother’s favorite tune, can be heard. However, the house has been seized by the Japanese, who march out immediately and capture all three. As Jim is held back, Basie is severely beaten.Basie and Jim find themselves in a holding center for foreign prisoners in Shanghai. They spend a significant amount of time there; Jim discovers that the other kids there will steal openly from him to survive, a tactic he also learns from Basie. One day, when the Japanese come to select prisoners for transport to an official camp, Basie is chosen, who boards the truck and ignores Jim’s pleas to take him along. Jim begs the driver to take him along and finds that the driver is unsure of the route to the camp. Jim assures the driver that he can guide them to the camp, which is near his parents’ old country club.
The truck driver throws the annoying Jim into the truck and they leave.The truck arrives at Soochow Creek Interment camp, which is situated right next to an airbase construction site. As the prisoners get off the truck they are ordered to carry white stones up to the spot where a runway is being laid. Jim breaks off from the group, seeing a work area for Japanese Zero airplanes. As he touches one of them, a guard, Nagata, prepares to shoot him. A group of three Japanese pilots approaches and Jamie salutes them; Nagata lowers his rifle when the pilots return Jamie’s salute.
The story jumps ahead to the Summer of 1945, near the end of the war. Jim has etched out a considerably active life for himself involving an intricate trade network among the other British prisoners and even Nagata himself, who has since been invested as the commanding officer of the camp. While dropping off Nagata’s freshly polished boots, Jim slyly steals a bar of soap from the sergeant. Jim’s last stop is at the camp infirmary, where he aides the camp doctor, Rawlins, in performing CPR on a dying patient.
The woman moves her eyes slightly, seemingly looking at Jim, who now believes he’s brought her back to life. Jim appears to lose control, frantically pumping the woman’s chest and Rawlins is forced to throw Jim off the dead woman. Rawlins has been schooling Jim in Latin and classical poetry, but is unable to teach Jim to recognize when his efforts go too far. Jim leaves the hospital and goes to the American prisoners barracks, delivering the soap to Basie. Basie shows Jim his latest project which involves laying snares in the marsh next to his barracks, hoping to catch pheasants for next Thanksgiving. Basie also makes a deal with Jim: if Jim lays the snares, Basie will let Jim move into the American dorm and take him along if he finds a way to escape the camp.That night the airbase is bombed by American pilots, who drop a bomb very close to the prison camp. In retaliation, Nagata and a few of his officers begin breaking windows in the British and American barracks. When Nagata moves on the infirmary, Rawlins tries to stop him.
The sergeant begins to violently and mercilessly beat the doctor. Jim steps in, smashing two windows and begging Nagata in Japanese to cease his punishment, which he does. Rawlins, in gratitude for Jim’s actions, gives Jim a pair of two tone golf shoes that belonged to a recently deceased patient.The next day, Jim steals away from the camp to the marsh near the American dorm. Waiting for the tower guard to sit down and leaving his golf spikes behind, he crawls into the marsh to place Basie’s snares. However, Basie has another motive for planting the traps: he is using Jim to test the marsh for mines. Moments later, Nagata appears and yells at the guard to take up his post. Nagata finds Jim’s shoes and wades into the marsh after him. He is just about to find Jim when a Japanese boy from the airbase calls the sergeant over; the boy has lost his toy glider in the marsh and Nagata retrieves it for him. As the two walk away, the boy salutes Jim, whom he’d seen all along. Jim is given his own space in the American dorm, much to Frank’s chagrin, who has to give up some of his own personal space for the young upstart.
One day, Basie and another American prisoner, Dainty, are going over potential escape plans using a cork and needle as a compass (provided them by Jim & his pilfering network). Nagata shows up unexpectedly and sees how comfortably Basie has been living. He also finds the bar of soap stolen by Jim and becomes instantly furious, beating Basie severely. Basie leaves Jim in charge of his possessions, knowing he’ll be sent to the infirmary. Jim visits him there after seeing through his binoculars that Basie has been given the mosquito net usually reserved for dying patients. (Basie tells him that he merely bribed Dr. Rawlins for it.) During their conversation, Basie suddenly asks Jim why he isn’t back at the dorm minding Basie’s things; Jim says that the older and larger men in the dorm took everything, Jim being fairly helpless to stop them. Ashamed, Jim leaves the American dorm shortly after Basie returns from the hospital.
Now essentially homeless, Jim awakes one morning after falling asleep on the grounds of the camp and sees a kamikaze ritual taking place at the airbase.
Moved by the ceremony, he begins to sing «Suo Gân» a Welsh folk song from his childhood days of singing in the choir. As the planes take off one suddenly explodes in midair; a squadron of American P-51 Mustang fighters have arrived and begin to destroy the airbase. Exhilarated, Jim climbs to the top of a bombed-out building to watch the battle and sees one of the American pilots waving at him. Jim begins to scream in joy. As the battle continues, Rawlins, fearing for Jim’s safety, yells for the boy to come down. Jim doesn’t listen and Rawlins climbs after him, finally catching him as the battle winds down. He yells at Jim to return to reality and Jim breaks down, saying he can’t recall what his parents looked like. Rawlins carries him down, Jim blankly reciting the poem that Rawlins had been teaching him.The next day, the camp is evacuated by Nagata. The prisoners are told that there will be food waiting for them further inland and a march is quickly started. As they leave, Jim sees the young Japanese boy he’d befriended through the camp wire taking the ceremonial drink of the kamikaze pilots.
The boy jumps into his plane but cannot take off because the plane refuses to fire up.The group reaches Nantao Stadium, many miles away, where the Japanese spoils from Shanghai are stored. Among the automobiles there, Jim finds his father’s old limo. After being told that there’s no food or water there, Jim stays behind with Mrs. Victor, a woman who acted as a guardian to Jim back in Soochow. Jim tells her to act dead so they can stay, however, Mrs. Victor actually dies. As a devastated Jim sits with her body, he sees a gigantic flash of light to the east, one of the atomic bombs dropped by the United States on Japan. Jim believes it is Mrs. Victor’s ascending soul, however, he hears a radio broadcast later that reports about the new weapon and the surrender of the Japanese Empire, ending the war.
As the starving and weakened Jim staggers back to Soochow he notices large canisters falling from the sky on parachutes. They are from the Red Cross and contain food and other supplies.
Jim gathers what he can and returns to the prison camp. There he finds the young Japanese boy from the airbase, who is angrily slashing at the marsh with his samurai sword. Recognizing Jim, he stumbles away crying. Jim hears an engine revving and sees a car break through a wall of fire. In the car are Basie and a couple of other men he’d joined up with who are looting the relief containers. The Japanese boy offers Jim a mango and is about to help Jim cut it with his katana when he is shot by one of Basie’s companions. As the man rushes over Jim flips him into the marsh and leaps on him, wildly punching him. Basie pulls Jim off, who turns his attention to the Japanese boy. He tries to revive him using CPR but the boy is clearly dead and Basie again pulls Jim off. As he tries to soothe Jim, Jim pulls away, a crazed look in his eye; Jim’s experiences during the war of stealing, death and fear have finally pushed him onto the path to adulthood. Basie decides to leave Jim behind, knowing Jim will survive.
Jim stays in the camp a bit longer, riding a bike like he did in childhood and laughing. He is found by a U.S. Army unit, to whom he «surrenders».Jim returns to Shanghai and is housed in an orphanage for child war prisoners. The kids are assembled by the nuns for a group of parents who have returned to Shanghai following the war; Jim’s parents are among them. They wade through the sea of children, not able to find Jim at first, but spot him after a few moments. Jim, scarred from his experiences and still in shock, doesn’t believe his own eyes as he recognizes his mother by her face and hair and eventually collapses in her loving arms.
See also
Taglines
|
Synopsis
|
Plot Keywords
|
Parents Guide
Getting Started
|
Contributor Zone »
Contribute to This Page
Film Empire of the Sun (USA, 1987) drama by Steven Spielberg on the theme of survival in the conditions of World War II.
Young Briton Jim Graham, who lived in China with his parents, after the capture of Shanghai by the Japanese, ends up in a concentration camp, where he will spend four years until the end of the war.
Stranasha
Genredrama, military
Directive Spielberg
Duration of 32 minutes
Date of exit December 9, 1987
Age restriction12+
Actors
Christian Bail, John Malkovich, Miranda Pantoliano, Joe Pantoliano, Lesli Fillarits Emily Richard, Rupert Fraser, Peter Gale, Takataro Kataoka
Films directed by Steven Spielberg
20
Steven Spielberg
75 years, 43 films
Spielberg comes from a generation of kids who grew up on TV and sci-fi, horror and The Twilight Zone, so it’s no surprise that he made his directorial debut on TV. At first he filmed TV series and all sorts of low-budget horror films (for example, Something Sinister) and was not afraid to be branded as a simple artisan and “man of the system”, however, acquaintance with the big authors of New Hollywood — Scorsese, Coppola, De Palma — contributed to the fact that he was imbued with the ideas of auteur cinema and personal expression.
His virtuoso television thriller The Duel was a hit with French critics, and the producers were so inspired by the high ratings that they asked Spielberg to shoot 15 minutes to release the film in theaters. After that, the director’s authorial ambitions grew by leaps and bounds: he wanted to make not films, but films, but the producer of «Jaws» David Brown persuaded him to finish this «very, very big film, so that later you can put pictures to your heart’s content.» «Jaws» became the first blockbuster in the history of world cinema (in fairness, it should be noted that blockbusters existed before that, but the horror about the great white shark gave this term a genre characteristic) and contributed to the death of auteur cinema in New Hollywood, but at the same time they turned commercial cinema into great art — such a paradox. Spielberg himself, by the way, is credited not only with the invention of the blockbuster, but also with the high concept (high concept), when the meaning of the film can be explained on the fingers.
Despite the fact that in the future the director made his dream come true: at the same time with the films he staged films, the feeling that he succeeds in a fun adventure movie (Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park, The Adventures of Tintin) is much better academic drama («Schindler’s List», «Munich», «Lincoln»). And all because in his entertaining films there is some kind of Godard lightness — it’s not for nothing that the French director Claude Lelouch said: “In Spielberg, I like Godard the most.”
Schindler List
1993, biography
Indiana Jones in search of a lost ark
1981, militant
Save Private Ryan
1998, militant
Park of the Jurassic period
1993, adventure
COMPARE
if you can
2002, Biography
Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade
1989, Action
Alien
1982, Adventure
Spy Bridge
2015, biography
Indiana Jones and the Temple of Fate
1984, militant
Special opinion
2002, mystic
terminal
2004, melodrama
Tintin’s adventure
2011, cartoon
linolnes
2012, Biography
Secret file
2017, Biography
Big and kind giant
2016, Adventure
Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull
2008, adventure
War of Worlds
2005, adventure
Artificial mind
2001, science fiction
First player Prepare
2018, action
Wester history
2021, musical
Best reviews about the film “Imperial Imperial sun»
4
Irina Pichugina
1 review, 1 rate, rating 1
9
I watched this film for the first time about 3 years ago completely by accident.
I couldn’t tear myself away. I found out that Christian Bale played the main role much later. brilliant actors of our time play there, I don’t think it’s necessary to say. This is obvious. For me, as a person who grew up and educated in the USSR, the main value of this film is that it opened a new page for me in the Second World War. Japan’s war against America in China is did we know anything about it? The film made me think about a lot and post a lot trying to find out from documentary sources. Thanks to Spielberg and everyone who created this film. I am very glad that the star of Christian Bale has risen. By the way, last week I watched another film on this topic, The Thin Red Line. I advise you to definitely watch it.
December 10, 2012
Angelika Beljakova
17 reviews, 23 ratings, rating 26
9
This film is worth noting, first of all, thanks to the brilliant performance of a very young Christian Bale. A little boy gets into a very difficult situation and is left without parents.
Thanks to the flexibility of the child’s psyche, he easily manages to adapt to new living conditions. Together with other Englishmen and an American (John Malkovich), he ends up in the camp, but he does not lose his love of life and here he manages to find entertainment for himself. Life in the camp in this film, in my opinion, is shown too easy already, but I think that is not the point and the main emphasis should be on the young hero. Particularly impressive is the final scene, where the boy finds his parents again. He no longer remembers them at all, only brown hair and mother’s red lipstick, but many women paint their lips. The father did not even pay attention to this young man in an American jacket and with bruises under his eyes and a buzz cut. But the heart of the mother suggested that we should carefully look at this adult boy beyond his years. He is still small in stature, but in his eyes the experience of an adult is clearly read, and I think this is precisely the genius of Bale’s acting talent.
September 17, 2008
homocat
77 reviews, 759 ratings, rating 39
5
«The thin red line» compared to this drag is a film for all time. Here Bale is good, but on the theme of a child in war there is nothing more powerful than Elem Klimov’s Come and See with Alexei Kravchenko in the title role.
What can Spielberg say — well done Americans, liberators! They throw Hershees chocolates from the sky and force kamikazes into peace. We see the same now in the news from Iraq and Syria.
October 12, 2014
Sergei Golutvin
3 reviews, 3 ratings, rating 0
1
I didn’t like the movie at all. Yes, I watched with interest the initial frames of the picture-panic in Shanghai: Spielberg is known as a fan of crowd scenes. Camera work, usually with Americans, is at a high level … well, nothing else was affected in the picture. The behavior of the boy (Christian Bale) often looks simply inadequate: when he tries to surrender to a Japanese soldier, he gives the impression of an imbecile (Japanese soldiers seem to have perceived him the same way), but what is the genius of the director’s idea here? Suppose that by creating such an image, the director wanted to show the refinement and unsuitability for life of a home boy from a wealthy family living in an aristocratic mansion and looking at life from his father’s “window of a personal car” before the war, but why then did the boy go through the harsh school of camp life for displaced persons over the course of 4 years, during which his character should already have been formed, tempered — he also behaves strangely, it is not clear when he meets the long-awaited American liberators (he is also trying to surrender to them)? -This is again some kind of «brilliant» idea Spielberg? -But I did not understand her «genius».
And where did the main character get such an ardent love for a Japanese boy, whom he saw several times (through barbed wire), and at the end exchanged a few words with him … and suddenly, for him, he furiously attacks his acquaintances, Daisy’s friend, ready to tear them to pieces, for the fact that they, again, out of good intentions, shot this Japanese boy? All this looks somehow unnatural, far-fetched.
Is the image of the adventurer Daisy revealed? An empty, insignificant little man, to whom the boy stuck only because there was no one else to go to, was dying of hunger. It is shown with rough strokes, carelessly, schematically, and what is interesting about it and what is remarkable about the performance of this role? The image of another friend of the boy-doctor: he seems to be positive, but did not affect him in any way, and it was precisely by playing this role that he was not revealed by the actor and the director’s intention. It turned out the role is not even of the second, but of the third plan: the background of general events.
The film itself is all incredibly stretched out — that’s just the semantic load of each episode of the film and does not carry: instead of 150 minutes, it was quite possible to shoot 30 and it would have turned out better — the film is overloaded with petty everyday and completely unnecessary details of camp life. In Bondarchuk’s famous film, the entire scene of the capture of the film’s hero and the German concentration camp fits in 15-20 minutes, and how capacious, dynamic and at the same time dramatic it is (just don’t spit on Bondarchuk’s name, under the pretext that how many now they do that it is a «scoop»)!
And the numerous scenes with Japanese pilots, with kamikaze did not cause any emotion in me: they only caused doubt-doubt in the director’s feigning of the scene itself.
Many admire this picture because it allegedly «shows the war through the eyes of a boy», the war «about which we, who grew up in the USSR, knew nothing» — completeness, maybe someone did not know, was not interested: for others, no historical there were no revelations in this picture.
And the war «through the eyes of a boy» …? — A strange boy: without a sense of patriotism, compassion for others, the grief and horrors of war, life in a concentration camp had little effect on his face, a boy living with animal instincts — to eat, sleep, play airplanes (and it doesn’t matter that they are Japanese, the same planes that bomb his compatriots). We saw other boys in the war and the war through the eyes of other boys: in «Ivan’s Childhood», «It Was in Intelligence», «Come and See» in the paintings of other masters and the comparison is not at all in favor of Spielberg and his war boy.
I have to admit that I have never been fascinated by any of Spielberg’s films. Is he a good director, is he brilliant … I would say fashionable!
April 7, 2013
All reviews
similar
5
City of life and death
2009, Historical
Flags of our fathers
2006, Historical
Pearl Harbor
2001, Melodrama
Letters from Ivodzima
2006 Historical
Road to Paradise
1997 Drama
Read also
April 17
Five-time Oscar nominee Allen Davio died of coronavirus so
Harry Potter movies
the best horror films for teenagers
Events
Create a unique page for your event on Afisha
This is an opportunity to tell a multi-million audience about it and increase attendance
2021, Russia, Historical
64 minutes
Victory Memories
2015, Russia, Documentary
44 minutes
Nuremberg To remember .
.. The process through the eyes of journalists
2004, Russia, Drama
Moscow Saga
2019, Kazakhstan, Drama
Born in a shirt
Actors
2017, Ukraine, melodramas
Rainbow in the sky
2020, Russia, Russia, Russia, Russia, Russia Comedy
80 minutes
Marusya Foreva!
actors
1991, USSR, Drama
117 minutes
Promised Heaven
2016, Russia, Documentaries
44 minutes
Retribution. After Nuremberg
2018, Russia, Crime
Expropriator
2015, Russia, Documentary
45 minutes
Nuremberg. A process that might not have happened
1966, USSR, Soviet
73 minutes
Elusive Avengers
2010, Russia, documentary
Great War
2008, Russia, Drama
Galina
2018, Russia, Drama
Bloody lady
2008, Drama
I will return
2009, Drama, Drama, Drama, Drama, Drama, Drama, Drama.
Wolf Messing: Seeing through time
1975, USSR, Soviet
95 minutes
White ship
2018, Kazakhstan, Drama
My brother
, Russia 20003
Svetlana
2019, Russia, Drama
101 minutes
I will give you victory
2020, Russia, Drama
101 minutes
GUDBAI, America
2022, Russia, comedy
minutes
Young people
2019, Russia, Family
103 minutes
Brownie
2018, Russia, Adventures
81 minutes
Three Bogatyrs and the Heir to the Throne
, Children0003
Films based on true events
War films
Popular films
Jim Graham has lived in Shanghai since he was a child, and although he is British by birth, he has never been to England. His father is a successful businessman, the family lives in a luxurious mansion in an expensive quarter of the city, and the boy never thought that life could be different. But the political situation is heating up — China is occupied by the Japanese, and the family does not have time to leave the country in time.
In a crowd of people frightened by explosions, Jim falls behind his parents and is left all alone in a huge city. He survives as best he can, and later meets with a dashing marauder named Basie, who will eventually turn an honest boy into a big rogue. Together they end up in a camp for captured British and Americans, and a long life begins behind barbed wire, where, although it is better than on the street, it is still very hungry. A new friend knows how to settle down everywhere, and Jim goes through a real school of life, or rather, survival. Now he knows how to get cigarettes and extra rations, where to trade for new shoes, and how to catch a pheasant. The psyche of a teenager does not have time to adapt to constant shocks, and from time to time he behaves at least strangely, but those who know him well trust him and help him survive. The war is over, and among the parents who came to look for their children, there are both Jim’s father and mother. In the final shots of the film, the family is reunited, although their son is no longer the cheerful boy they saw him last.
leagepant
Very cool movie! Encourages to think. The guy overcame so much, having only one hope. The Empire of the Sun was removed a long time ago, but has not lost its value. I think it’s too early for children to watch this, but I recommend it for adults.
September 18, 2012
