Synopsis
In the summer of 1941, the United States and Japan seem on the brink of war after constant embargos and failed diplomacy come to no end. "Tora! Tora! Tora!", named after the code words use by the lead Japanese pilot to indicate they had surprised the Americans, covers the days leading up to the attack on Pearl Harbor, which plunged America into the Second World War.
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Cast
- Martin BalsamAdmiral Husband E. Kimmel
- Sō YamamuraVice-Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto
- Joseph CottenHenry L. Stimson, U.S. Secretary of War
- Tatsuya MihashiCommander Minoru Genda
- E.G. MarshallLt. Colonel Rufus S. Bratton
- James WhitmoreVice Admiral William F. 'Bull' Halsey Jr.
- Takahiro TamuraLt. Commander Mitsuo Fuchida
- Eijirō TōnoAdmiral Chuici Nagumo
- Jason RobardsLt. General Walter C. Short
- Wesley AddyLt. Commander Alwin D. Kramer
Recommendations
- 88
ReelViews
It's rare for a feature film to attain the trifecta of entertaining, informing, and educating. - 80
IGN
Watching real planes crashing into real planes on a runway is flatout exciting, and the bombing sequence here is easily the equal of anything that Michael Bay could do. - 67
The A.V. Club
The careful balancing of the two sides produces its own interesting effect, however, showing how war goes from possible to inevitable, whatever the wishes on either side. Had Tora! Tora! Tora! taken the notion a bit further, it might have created a portrait of escalating tension chilling enough to rival its carefully orchestrated climactic bombing raid. - 60
Time Out
There's something of a soft shoe shuffle to avoid treading on national sensibilities. But the climax, in particular, manages to be more than just a shoot-out, with Fleischer's intelligent direction generating a real feeling of chaos and apocalypse. - 50
TV Guide Magazine
The Japanese sneak attack that plunged the US into WW II is lavishly and fairly accurately, if not enthrallingly, brought to the screen in this Japanese-US coproduction. - 40
The New York Times
From the moment you read the ads for Tora! Tora! Tora! ("The Most Spectacular Film Ever Made!”), you are aware that you're in the presence of a film possessed by a lack of imagination so singular that it amounts to a death wish. - 40
Variety
Both overall director Richard Fleischer and his Japanese counterparts do a dull job, and the monotonously low-key tone of scene after scene almost suggests that each was filmed without a sense of ultimate slotting in the finished form. - 25
Chicago Sun-Times
Tora! Tora! Tora! is one of the deadest, dullest blockbusters ever made.
