Battle for Saipan

Maybe it was a bet?

Maybe it was a dare?

Maybe it was a a favour?

Maybe somebody's eight year old and his pals got together and wrote a script and all these other people decided to take the easy money?

Maybe the studio needed a loser for tax purposes?

Maybe Casper and Jeff needed something on their resumes to distract from something else?

Maybe reading these reviews is time better spent and considerably more entertaining than watching this inconceivably, incomprehensibly poorly executed motion picture?

Maybe some viewers have amazingly low standards and were never exposed to anything better, and so write 10 star reviews and chide everyone else for recognizing and writing about what a steaming pile this dead turkey is?

Maybe I really had to struggle to find enough things to meet the character limit, and at no point could I dredge up anything positive or redeeming to say?

After writing my senior thesis on Saipan it is surprising to me that they decided to make a movie victimizing the Americans. The battle was a failure to fight for survival by the Japanese. What they're trying to cover is a large push back order by general Saito. About 4,000 men were gathered and told to give their lives in a suicidal charge. This charge was ordered knowing that the Japanese had no hope. The soldiers charged with sticks and rocks and whatever they had left. The wounded were killed. The movie is completely baffling. Should focus on the Japanese POV if it wanted to serve history.

Every male actor a hunk, every female actor a model. Then we get to the story; 'based on real events'. Yeah, very loosely. Casting should have been fired way before a camera was hired.

It just has that 80's made for TV feel, yup, worse than The A-Team, that bad. The dialogue is awful, the acting far too intense in the minor moments. Sometimes less is more, guys.

Of course the Japanese just throw themselves at machine guns like they were never trained in the basics. Of course the GI's are so proficient at unarmed combat. The Japanese would never have any idea about Karate or Jiu Jitsu. How could they despite inventing it?

Really not good in any way. Have the production team bigged this up on review sites? Mmmm?

At least I didn't hear a kookaburra...

Dreadful plot. Historically inaccurate. Geographically inaccurate. Biologically inaccurate. Guns with endless ammunition. Soldiers that bunch up together and still don't die. Soldiers that don't take cover and still don't die. Japanese soldiers that can't throw grenades around corners. Japanese soldiers that roam and attack in single file. Subtitles required for non US English speakers. 'Merica!

Three stars for knife action and manly grunting.

This movie is best skipped. It strains to evoke much at all in the viewer. It solipsistic in that you have no idea where the rest of the US military is located.

The acting is not good at all, the screenplay is not good at all, and it is very, very loosely based on any real WW2 events. Basically using the name Saipan, and actors who look Japanese, is about as close to 'historically accurate' as it gets.

I kept waiting for the dead people to start walking around, like some low-budget zombie movie or something.

I have somehow made it to the 45 minute mark, because I'm scrolling on fb and dropped the remote.

If you are in the middle of some home repairs and need a little break from watching paint dry, this is your movie! Otherwise, do not waste your time.