Kamikaze: An Untold History

Jul 28, 2025

1h 30m

★ 10.0

Overview

On the Pacific front, towards the end of World War II, Japan's imperial armed forces launched 'kamikaze' attacks - suicide missions by aircraft laden with bombs. It was a mad operation with no hope of returning alive, but the nation went wild, and the attacks continued for ten months, literally until the very last day of the war. Close to 4,000 Japanese airmen died, and nearly 7,000 Allied military personnel were killed, and thousands more were injured by the attacks. How could this happen? Utilising 15 years' worth of extensive interviews with US and Japanese World War II veterans, Takayuki Oshima’s film delves into the mechanism of how a crazed madness swept through an entire nation.

Genres

Documentary

War

Production Companies

NHK

Kamikaze: An Untold History Trailers

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Cast

Self - Narrator (voice)

Togo Igawa

Tomokazu Kasai

Hayao Fujimoto

Douglas MacArthur

Emperor Hirohito of Japan

Yusuke Orita

Oskar Matzerath is a very unusual boy. Refusing to leave the womb until promised a tin drum by his mother, Agnes, Oskar is reluctant to enter a world he sees as filled with hypocrisy and injustice, and vows on his third birthday to never grow up. Miraculously, he gets his wish. As the Nazis rise to power in Danzig, Oskar wills himself to remain a child, beating his tin drum incessantly and screaming in protest at the chaos surrounding him.

6.9

Pearl Harbor

May 21, 2001

The lifelong friendship between Rafe McCawley and Danny Walker is put to the ultimate test when the two ace fighter pilots become entangled in a love triangle with beautiful Naval nurse Evelyn Johnson. But the rivalry between the friends-turned-foes is immediately put on hold when they find themselves at the center of Japan's devastating attack on Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941.

7.2

The English Patient

Nov 14, 1996

In the 1930s, Count Almásy is a Hungarian map maker employed by the Royal Geographical Society to chart the vast expanses of the Sahara Desert along with several other prominent explorers. As World War II unfolds, Almásy enters into a world of love, betrayal, and politics.

8.4

The Pianist

Sep 17, 2002

The true story of pianist Władysław Szpilman's experiences in Warsaw during the Nazi occupation. When the Jews of the city find themselves forced into a ghetto, Szpilman finds work playing in a café; and when his family is deported in 1942, he stays behind, works for a while as a laborer, and eventually goes into hiding in the ruins of the war-torn city.

8.6

Schindler's List

Dec 15, 1993

The true story of how businessman Oskar Schindler saved over a thousand Jewish lives from the Nazis while they worked as slaves in his factory during World War II.

7.2

Closely Watched Trains

Nov 18, 1966

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8.2

Night and Fog

Apr 27, 1959

Filmmaker Alain Resnais documents the atrocities behind the walls of Hitler's concentration camps.

7.8

The Bridge on the River Kwai

Oct 11, 1957

The classic story of English POWs in Burma forced to build a bridge to aid the war effort of their Japanese captors. British and American intelligence officers conspire to blow up the structure, but Col. Nicholson, the commander who supervised the bridge's construction, has acquired a sense of pride in his creation and tries to foil their plans.

7.4

Enemy at the Gates

Feb 28, 2001

A Russian and a German sniper play a game of cat-and-mouse during the Battle of Stalingrad in WWII.

8.2

Saving Private Ryan

Jul 24, 1998

As U.S. troops storm the beaches of Normandy, three brothers lie dead on the battlefield, with a fourth trapped behind enemy lines. Ranger captain John Miller and seven men are tasked with penetrating German-held territory and bringing the boy home.

0.0

Das Tal der sieben Monde

Feb 10, 1967

Based on the novel of the same name by Harry Turk. 1944. In occupied Poland, a railway line is being built to transport lead ore to Germany. The Valley of Seven Moons is restless, with construction materials disappearing and people vanishing. The occupiers feel uneasy on foreign soil. Despite increased security, partisans carry out one act of sabotage after another, hindering construction in every way possible. The German Rudek and the Jewish girl Martina, who at first stand aside from any struggle, join the partisan detachment.

0.0

V hodine dvanástej

Aug 28, 1959

Nazi soldiers committed atrocities even when sober – and if they got drunk, they did even worse. The inhabitants of a Slovak village during the national uprising learn this when they have to accept an arrogant Hitlerite guard. When two soldiers go missing, the unit commander threatens to have five hostages executed for each of them as a warning. And he refuses to change his order, even when it turns out that drunkenness is to blame for the unfortunate incident. But the villagers get justifiably angry and take up arms.

0.0

I Wish I Were a Pigeon

Feb 22, 1990

The story of German minority members who, after escaping from Wehrmacht, form a partisan unit named "Ernst Thalmann" in eastern Croatia. The focus is a family whose members fight on different sides of the barricade.

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7.0

Ako sa Vinco zaťal

Jan 1, 1977

An unconventionally seen story from the period of the Slovak National Uprising will especially interest you with the character of the village lad and brawler Vince Kucek, played by Ivan Romančík. Hours and hours spent in the pub, riots with friends, scenes of jealousy towards his old rival Petr Chuťek, now a partisan commander, hostile memories of the strict teacher Machoň – all this fills the seemingly carefree days of the self-confident farmer, father of two small children, husband of the faithful, devoted Eva. However, the situation in the village is getting worse. Some of the men go to fight in the mountains, but the stubborn Kucek refuses to go with them.

7.6

The Dirty Dozen

Jun 15, 1967

12 American military prisoners in World War II are ordered to infiltrate a well-guarded enemy château and kill the Nazi officers vacationing there. The soldiers, most of whom are facing death sentences for a variety of violent crimes, agree to the mission and the possible commuting of their sentences.

5.7

John Ford Goes to War

Jan 1, 2002

When World War II broke out, John Ford, in his forties, commissioned in the Naval Reserve, was put in charge of the Field Photographic Unit by Bill Donavan, director of the soon-to-be-OSS. During the war, Field Photo made at least 87 documentaries, many with Ford's signature attention to heroism and loss, and many from the point of view of the fighting soldier and sailor. Talking heads discuss Ford's life and personality, the ways that the war gave him fulfillment, and the ways that his war films embodied the same values and conflicts that his Hollywood films did. Among the films profiled are "Battle of Midway," "Torpedo Squadron," "Sexual Hygiene," and "December 7."

7.5

Sunflower

Mar 14, 1970

After World War II, a woman refuses to believe her husband, missing on the Russian front, is dead. Flashbacks reveal their brief courtship and marriage. Years later, she travels to Russia with his photo, determined to find him. What will she discover?

7.5

Letters from Iwo Jima

Dec 9, 2006

The story of the battle of Iwo Jima between the United States and Imperial Japan during World War II, as told from the perspective of the Japanese who fought it.

5.5

Keep 'Em Slugging

Mar 1, 1943

A gang of tough street kids decide to go straight and get jobs in order to free draft-age men for the war effort. However, because of their past tangles with the law, they can't find anybody who'll hire them. Finally one of them gets a job at the department store where his sister works, but runs afoul of a store executive who is in league with a ring of hijackers.

5.5

The Black Parachute

May 4, 1944

A paratrooper drops behind enemy lines to rescue the deposed king of a mythical Balkan nation.

Kamikaze: An Untold History

Overview

Genres

Production Companies

Kamikaze: An Untold History Trailers