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Japanese nationalists to make own Nanjing movie
2007-01-24
A Chinese girl places a chrysanthemum flower on an altar to mourn the victims of the Nanjing Massacre in Nanjing, east China's Jiangsu province, August 14, 2005. A series of activities were held across China on Sunday to mark the 60th anniversary of the end of World War Two. |
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Japanese nationalists have announced plans to produce their own film on the Nanjing Massacre to counter a series of movies coming out this year on its 70th anniversary. The project is certain to infuriate many Chinese, for whom Japanese troops' December 1937 massacre of the captive city remains a source of deep bitterness. The film, tentatively called "The Truth of Nanjing", will be directed by Satoru Mizushima, the head of a nationalist television satellite channel. "If we remain silent, anti-Japanese propaganda will spread across the world," Mizushima told a news conference Wednesday flanked by dozens of supporters, including members of the Japanese parliament. "What is important is to correct the historical record and send right messages," he said. He announced a committee of conservative scholars and politicians to solicit public donations to make the movie, which they hope to finish by the year's end. Chinese historians say some 300,000 civilians were slaughtered in an orgy of murder, rape and destruction by Japanese troops in the eastern city. Allied trials of Japanese war criminals documented 140,000 dead. Some Japanese historians say the toll was less or deny the massacre altogether, alleging that victims were soldiers and not civilians. Mizushima said a total of seven films on the massacre were slated for release this year. A US production entitled "Nanking", after the city's old name, is currently being screened at the Sundance Film Festival. It features actors, including Woody Harrelson, who read accounts of the massacre interspersed with footage and interviews with survivors. Chinese state media have also announced a movie based on the best-selling book "The Rape of Nanking" by late American author Iris Chang, which Xinhua news agency last year called China's "Schindler's List", referring to Steven Spielberg's Oscar-winning 1993 Holocaust film. Friction over history continues to haunt relations between Japan and China. China saw rare street protests in 2005 after Japan approved an avowedly nationalist history textbook that made only a passing reference to Nanjing.
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