![]() The script earlier had to be approved not only by Twentieth Century Fox executives but also by the U.S. Kurosawa also rejected the ending scene in which, after the attack, Meiji Emperor’s poem lamenting warring human beings was narrated. Kurosawa rejected the American team’s rewrite on the opening scene of Admiral Yamamoto’s command ceremony two years before Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor. The contract included no such clause.Įven before the shooting started, the American and Japanese teams clashed over the script. The authority for final decisions rested with the CEO and Executive Producer of Twentieth Century Fox, although Kurosawa thought he had been authorized not only to supervise the movie making but to approve the final editing of the film. Rather, he was relegated to being a hired gun for the Japanese portion of the film. Had Kurosawa read it, he would have discovered that, contrary to his belief, he did not have supervising authority over the entire movie, including the American battle scenes. He briefed Kurosawa about progress in negotiating with the Americans but only orally Kurosawa never saw the contract or signed it, although lengthy negotiations and agreements on production details, which Kurosawa signed, made the contract legally binding. ![]() Aoyagi had total control of communications between Kurosawa and the Americans. Without knowledge of English, Kurosawa relied on Aoyagi in negotiations with Twentieth Century Fox. Kurosawa, who was a genius in movie making but who had little business sense, became frustrated artistically and professionally as his production company plunged deep into debt. A former New York representative of Toho Movies, Aoyagi was recruited by Kurosawa to look for joint projects that would be financed with foreign funding. It was personified in the controversial figure of Tetsuro Aoyagi, Kurosawa’s producer. The author of this well researched book, Hiroshi Tasogawa, tells a fascinating story of what went wrong in this cross-cultural encounter that began with good intentions and shared dreams but ended in destroying Kurosawa’s reputation and causing substantial financial damage to Twentieth Century Fox.įrom the beginning, the language barrier between Americans and Japanese played a major role in the fiasco. Kurosawa was replaced by two Japanese directors, Toshio Masuda and Kinji Fukasaku, with whom Williams completed the project. One year and eight months later, Twentieth Century Fox asked Kurosawa to resign, citing his deteriorating health. Williams loved Kurosawa movies such as “Rashomon,” “Ikiru,” and “Seven Samurai.” Kurosawa accepted the offer and preparations began at full speed. Williams recommended enlisting Kurosawa as director and script editor for the Japanese team, even though he had never met Kurosawa. As the CEO of Twentieth Century Fox, he turned to his old friend and Oscar winning editor and producer, Elmo Williams, to supervise the project. The prominent Hollywood mogul, Darryl Zanuck, having produced “The Longest Day, “a spectacular film about the allied landing on D-day in Normandy that was done with a multi-national cast and crew, was drawn to the idea of a similar movie on Pearl Harbor. The world-famous movie director, Akira Kurosawa, stood before 150 guests in the banquet hall of Tokyo Prince Hotel in April of 1967 and declared: “This movie on Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, in collaboration with Twentieth Century Fox, will be the most important work in my career.” On that day, both the American team headed by the veteran producer, Elmo Williams, and the Kurosawa team had no doubt that the movie “Tora! Tora! Tora!” would be a masterpiece of human drama from the perspective of both Americans and Japanese.
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