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| Photograph AP |
FANTASTIC NEWS FROM JAPAN!!!!
Fans of world famous rock star MIYAVI in Japan, will finally be able to go to the local cinema and see their homegrown samurai guitarist in his first leading role in a Hollywood movie as a professional actor in the controversial film titled "Unbroken" on the big screen.
Angelina Jolie' s film about an American 'Prisoner Of War' (POW) tortured by the Japanese which
MIYAVI is the main character of horrendous actions which although personally difficult for him to act out the part of "T
he Bird" the sadistic prison guard, against the prisoner Olympic runner
Louis Zamperini, displayed many dimensions of his acting ability which was superb. You can read our
full movie review here.
Based on Laura Hillenbrand's bestselling 2010 book "Unbroken: A World War II Story of Survival, Resilience and Redemption", the film was condemned by conservatives in Japan as racist and 'anti-Japanese' for its depictions of sadistic prison guards torturing Zamperini including other POW's but was in movie form, released in the U.S. and many other countries but Japan had too many issues with debuting the movie in the country due to so much controversy preventing the release which must have been a blow to the whole Jolie crew including MIYAVI who did take a major chance of offending his home country by accepting the role which did take some coaxing and personal reflection to make his decision to star in the movie.
Right-wing activists launched campaigns on Change.org and Facebook calling for the film to be banned, and for Jolie to be told she was no longer welcome in Japan. A spokesman for the ultra-conservative pressure group the Society for the Dissemination of Historical Fact described the film as “pure fabrication”.
Zamperini, who died last year aged 97, later returned to Japan to meet his captors, but his chief wartime tormentor, a prison guard named Mutsuhiro Watanabe, (who MIYAVI portrayed) reportedly turned down his request for a meeting.
The Japanese promotional posters for the film describe it as the true story of a man “who survived hell for two years at a prison camp”.
Jolie said she was not concerned about the criticism of her film. “It’s a beautiful film that has a beautiful message,” she told USA Today in December ahead of the film’s worldwide release.
“We were very conscious of showing all sides of the war, including the bombing of Tokyo. But this is Louis’ experience and he … had a very difficult time as a POW. So we want to pay respect and show that all people suffer in war.”
Japanese indie distributor Bitters End now plans to open the film on a single screen in Tokyo's Shibuya district in February 2016.
MIYAVI currently completed his European tour called "The Others" while promoting his digital single which is the theme song to the movie "Mission Impossible" with further dates to perform in Japan and Korea.
