2015
By V.M Vermeer
For dhr. prof. dr. W.
Klinkert
American Propaganda in World War II Movies:
The Decline of Idealistic Liberalism in the OWI when
Portraying the Japanese Enemy
American Propaganda in World War II Movies:
The Decline of Idealistic Liberalism in the OWI when
Portraying the Japanese Enemy
By V.M Vermeer
Student number:
10885056
Master thesis
University of Amsterdam
For
Dhr. prof. dr. W. Klinkert
Military History
Date:
June 2015
Word count: 22543
Preface
I have always been fascinated by propaganda and, when looking for a subject for my thesis, I was immediately attracted to studying something related to propaganda. I did not know what subject, however, and desperately looked for a topic connected to propaganda that had not yet been studied. I initially had a very wide scope, with a time period considerably longer than that of the Second World War, with far more countries than the United States of America, and concerned with the entire subject of propaganda. Fortunately Professor Klinkert and Professor Amersfoort advised me during the thesis presentation to focus more on a single subject. I reduced the focus of my thesis to just the United States, and, more specifically, to a specific agency. Moreover, instead of studying all propaganda, I sought to focus only on movies, and only during World War II. After that, I decided to also focus on the portrayal of the Japanese in propaganda as I think it is an interesting subject. Over time the focus of my thesis evolved as I learned more about the subject. Questions that I had initially asked proved to be irrelevant. These include questions such as: ‘How did they convince the people to support the war?’ This question was not worth asking given that the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor accomplished that task for most Americans. I hope that anyone else who is fascinated by propaganda also enjoys this thesis and learns something about the subject. I suspect that many will be surprised at the ‘war’ that was fought and lost between the idealistic propagandists and reality. I would like to thank my professors for their help, my parents for feeding me, the authors of the books I have used, the people who kindly made primary sources available and my friends who participated in my brainstorming. In addition, I should thank the propagandists and Hollywood for making the propaganda movies I examined during this thesis.
Abstract
This thesis focuses on the way in which the Japanese people are portrayed in World War II films. These films were often made in cooperation with the American government for the purpose of propaganda. The Office of War Information was a very idealistic agency, but its ideals are not always noticeable in the films. It believed in the equality off all races and that propaganda should reflect this. This can be seen in the portrayal of the Allied nations and African Americans, as well as in the portrayal of Germans and Italians. However, the portrayal of the Japanese does not reflect this idealism. The Bureau of Motion Pictures branch of the Office of War Information failed to influence the portrayal of the Japanese in wartime movies. Despite this, the portrayal did improve during the war, but it never came close to comparing with the portrayal of the Germans. It is difficult to thank the Bureau of Motion Pictures for this improvement in portrayal due to its lackluster work in this field. Rather, one should look to those idealistic men from Hollywood who changed the way the Japanese were portrayed out of their own volition.
Table of Contents
Introduction 6
What is Propaganda? 9
What was the position of propaganda in American society? 12 Which American government organizations were responsible for propaganda? 14
What were the propagandists’ ideals? 18
What was the situation in Hollywood when the Bureau of Motion Pictures was established? 24 How were the Japanese generally thought of during the war? 27 How did the propagandists of the Office of War Information work with Hollywood? 29 How can the influence of the Office of War Information propagandists be seen in the movies? 42 What were the results of the Office of War Information’s influence? 65
Conclusion 71
Introduction
Most people have seen propaganda, whether they realize it or not. Propaganda can be incredibly overt or it can be subtle. All of the major warring powers used propaganda during World War II. This was easier for some countries than it was for others. With a strongly centralized state, the Nazis could easily disseminate their propaganda to the German people and to the rest of the world. However, the Americans lived in a democracy, which made it more difficult to control people with propaganda. In this thesis, I examine the American propaganda effort. This began very idealistically, with most of its top men being strongly liberal supporters of the New Deal policy. Their struggle to balance their ideals with the reality of the war and the need to persuade the American people lies at the center of this thesis. These ideals included a world of equality in which men of all races, creeds and religions were joined together in a democracy. However, the racial aspect of this idea was not easy to portray in propaganda, especially in the case of the Japanese. The United States was not kind to the Japanese people during World War II, and this included Japanese Americans. The portrayal of Japanese Americans in American movies provides an ideal example of the failure of the American propagandists in the Office of War Information (OWI) to keep their ideals of telling the truth and promoting equality.
In order to prepare for this thesis, I looked at a wide variety of American propaganda efforts and concluded that the medium of film was the best one to focus on in this research. There are four reasons for this. Firstly, the United States excels in films and Hollywood was having its golden age during World War II. While there were and are other countries with movie industries, at that time none was as large and influential as Hollywood. Secondly, during my research I found quotes from top propaganda men saying that film was the most effective domestic propaganda weapon they had. Thirdly, the medium of film is a visual medium that also uses sound. This makes it excellent as a propaganda medium, allowing the propagandists to influence people with both auditory and visual information. Most other propaganda mediums are only able to use one of these ways. Fourthly, the medium of film is interesting because the amount of control the OWI actually had over it varied greatly. This led to great variation in how far the movies stuck to propaganda ideals. These factors, together with the need for movies to entertain, created a unique situation where the OWI ideals frequently failed to make it onto the screen. The cases where this failing was most
obvious are the cases that deal with the portrayal of the Japanese. Those cases will be central to this thesis.
The Research Problem is:
If the employees of the Office of War information were so liberal and were against racism, then why was American World War II propaganda so racist?
The research question of this thesis is as follows:
Did the propagandists of the Office of War Information manage to effectively propagandize the American people through the medium of movies while remaining true to their ideals regarding the portrayal of the enemy, specifically the Japanese?
To find the answer to this question I will first answer several questions, each of which has its own chapter
1. What is propaganda?
2. What was the position of propaganda in American society?
3. Which American government organizations were responsible for propaganda? 4. What were the propagandists’ ideals?
5. What was the situation in Hollywood when the Bureau of Motion Pictures was established? 6. How were the Japanese generally thought of during the war?
7. How did the propagandists of the Office of War Information work with Hollywood?
8. How can the influence of the Office of War Information propagandists be seen in the movies?
9. What were the results of the Office of War Information’s influence?
Chapter One provides the definition of propaganda that will be used throughout the thesis and also gives a short introduction to different types of propaganda. Chapter Two presents background information on the position of propaganda in American society. Chapter Three describes the various government institutions responsible for propaganda. Chapter Four is concerned with the ideals of the American propagandists. Chapter Five looks at the situation in Hollywood before the Bureau of Motion Pictures started to influence it. Chapter Six considers the way in which the Japanese were thought of during the war in order to provide context to their portrayal in propaganda. Chapter Seven provides practical examples in order to portray the propagandists’ interactions with Hollywood and their influence on the movies made during the
war and also looks at the content of those movies. Chapter Eight looks at the results of that influence on public opinion in and the movies.
I am not the first person to study propaganda. Scholars such as Clayton R. Koppes and Gregory D. Black have performed extensive research into American propaganda during World War II. Many other authors have written on both propaganda and the way the Japanese were perceived during World War II, but I did not find a book that specifically combined these subjects. This is a subject that cannot be avoided so it came up frequently, but most works did not make the connection between the ideals of the Office of War Information and the portrayal of the Japanese, or if they did this it was only a small chapter of the work and was not the focus. There have also been many theses on subjects related to this such as the role of Women in propaganda, the use of cartoons in propaganda, the downfall of the Bureau of Motion Pictures and specifically on the portrayal of Japanese Americans. What I hope to offer in this thesis is a new look at the way in which the Office of War Information’s branch, the Bureau of Motion Pictures, did or did not influence how the Japanese were portrayed in the war movies of the era. In order to do this, I considered several aspects related to propaganda and the Bureau of Motion Pictures it’s the history. I then analyzed several movies that they either were or were not involved in, in order to discover how much effect they actually had on their content. Finally, I examined whether their propaganda had an effect on public opinion in order to discover how successful they were at propagandizing.
What is propaganda?
Before one can write on a subject related to propaganda, one needs to define the word propaganda. Several definitions are given for propaganda and they all share common elements. Merriam-Webster defines propaganda as ‘ideas or statements that are often false or exaggerated and that are spread in order to help a cause, a political leader, a government, etc.’1 In Hollywood
Goes to War: How Politics, Profits, and Propaganda Shaped World War II Movies, propaganda is
broadly defined as ‘the expression of opinions or actions carried out deliberately by individuals or groups with a view to influencing the opinions or actions of other individuals or groups for predetermined ends and through psychological manipulations.’2 Richard Shale notes that propaganda is difficult to define, but argues that any definition should include the key words ‘emotion’ and ‘persuasion’, and that the definition should include that it requires a response from the audience and is produced by organizations.3 A conference on Contemporary Soviet Propaganda and Disinformation held after World War II and sponsored by the U.S. Department of State and the CIA concluded that propaganda:
involves the dissemination of information—facts, arguments, rumors, half-truths or lies— to influence public opinion. As a systematic effort to persuade, it is an act of advocacy in mass communications, involving the making of deliberately one-sided statements to a mass audience. In this, it is not necessarily deceptive. Propaganda, then, is a process—a form of manipulative communication designed to elicit some predetermined response— ‘the organized spreading of special doctrines, information, ideas or beliefs to promote or injure a cause, group, nation, etc.’4
1
Merriam-Webster, ‘Propaganda’ (version 25 April 2015) http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/propaganda (25 April 2015).
2
Clayton R. Koppes and Gregory D. Black, Hollywood Goes to War: How Politics, Profits, and Propaganda Shaped World War II Movies (New York 1987) 49-50.
3
Richard Shale, Donald Duck Joins Up: The Walt Disney Studio During World War II (Ann Arbor 1982) 12.
4
Martin Kaplan and Johanna Blakley, Warners’ War: Politics, Pop Culture and Propaganda in Wartime Hollywood (Los Angeles 2004) 68.
Ted J. Smith writes that the definitions of propaganda can be divided into two groups. There are those that trace its origins to the Catholic missions to spread the faith and for whom propaganda is not necessarily a negative term. And there are those that always see propaganda as something negative, which is carried out by their opponents for the purpose of manipulating public opinion. Smith defines propaganda as every conscious and open attempt to influence the attitude of individuals and groups, guided by a predefined goal and characterized by the systematic use of irrational and often unethical techniques of persuasion.5 Leonard W. Doob, former director of the Overseas Intelligence department of the Office of War Information, provides the following definition of propaganda:
Intentional propaganda is a systemic attempt by an interested individual (or individuals) to control the attitudes of groups of individuals through the use of suggestion and, consequently, to control their actions; unintentional propaganda is the control of the attitudes and, consequently, the actions of groups of individuals through the use of suggestion.6
He recognizes two types of propaganda. Intentional propaganda is deliberately created in order to further a goal without concern for the facts and unintentional propaganda attempts to educate by using facts and the truth, but it still influences opinion because it showcases a specific viewpoint by only using certain facts.7
Thus a variety of experts have given several different definitions of propaganda. By combining the key elements, one can say that all propaganda:
attempts to influence public opinion and to persuade the public to support a certain cause by means of the spreading of information that frequently appeals to human emotions and may or not be factual but is almost certainly manipulated and is spread by organizations.
5
Ted J. Smith, Propaganda: A Pluralistic perspective (New York 1989)65-94.
6
Leonard W. Doob, Propaganda: Its Psychology and Techniques (New York 1939) 89.
7
In order to achieve their goal of persuading and influencing the public, the propagandists can use several different techniques. They can lie, they can accuse the opponent of misdeeds, they can hide the truth, they can twist the truth, they can change history to suit their goals, they can use symbolism, they can intentionally misrepresent statistics and facts, they can change the facts to suit their different audiences, they can use double standards, they can claim facts that cannot be proven, use misleading suggestions, use stereotypes, use misleading language and materials, use words that mean different things for different people, associate certain acts with positive or negative elements, and so on.8
There are various forms of media available for the propagandist. I have already made clear that this thesis will focus on the form of the movie, but it is worth noting some of the other types of media that were at the disposal of the propagandists during the Second World War. They could use newspapers, the radio, film, pamphlets, leaflets, handbills, books, magazines, skywriting, town criers, public meetings, and rumors.
Armed with this knowledge of what propaganda is, how the propagandists can act and what media they have at their disposal to propagandize, the following chapter will shed further light on the state of propaganda in American society during the Second World War.
8
Smith, Propaganda, 65-94. Doob, Propaganda, 25-68.
What was the position of propaganda in American society?
Of course, propaganda was not simply willed into existence by the men and women of the Office of War Information. It existed before that, and Americans were aware of it before that. Propaganda had a bad reputation in the United States. Due to the role it played during World War I. Part of the fault lies with George Creel, whose propaganda campaign had left people with a negative impression of propaganda. Creel had used two main techniques in his propaganda, namely: Atrocity stories and hate pictures. An example of an atrocity story is the frequent portrayal of German soldiers as barbarians killing Belgian women and children. Hate pictures should speak for themselves: they portrayed the enemy as monsters or as barbaric Huns. Since 1917, Creel’s Committee on Public Information had invaded the American home front with posters, pamphlets and speakers who had attempted to combat opposition to the war and to persuade the American people that sacrifices were necessary if democracy was to survive. He presented a religious crusade that portrayed the Americans as those that would save the world in the war and bring about a better age. When that did not occur after the war, the propaganda was blamed for overselling the war effort and gained a bad reputation. Moreover, many felt that there was guilt on both sides and that British propaganda had tricked the American people into participating in the war.9
In addition to this bad reputation due to the role of propaganda in the First World War, there was also a powerful faction of isolationists who rightly viewed propaganda as the weapon of the enemy. After all, propaganda at the time supported intervention in the war. The isolationists counted influential men among their number, such as the celebrity pilot Charles Lindbergh, the Roman Catholic radio priest Father Coughlin and many members of Congress. Even though their influence declined as the war in Europe raged on, they kept attacking what they perceived as the propagandists until the attack on Pearl Harbor ruined any chance of keeping the United States of America out of the war. Hollywood was also a popular target for them, as they perceived its action movies as pro-interventionist propaganda. Furthermore, despite having set up various propaganda
9
Allan M. Winkler, The Politics of Propaganda: The Office of War Information, 1942-1945 (London 1978) 1-7.
Anthony Rhodes, Propaganda, The Art of Persuasion: World War II (Leicester 1993) 139-176.
Wiliam L. O’Neill, A Democracy at War: America’s Fight at Home and Abroad in World War II (New York 1993) 129-152.
organs, President Roosevelt was also suspicious of propaganda. Initially, many ranking military officers were also not fans of propaganda. They preferred to say nothing at all, fearing that any information, no matter how innocuous, could be used against them. They also saw it as a cowardly tactic.10
It should not be forgotten that the United States was a democracy. It is more difficult to organize propaganda in democratic countries, as lies are more easily exposed due to the freedom of the press, something which dictatorships lack. The propagandists also have to hold themselves to more rules. They cannot simply order people around, but have to persuade them. People in a democracy also lack the expected indoctrination that is a part of living in a dictatorship; they tend to think for themselves and are willing to criticize their leaders. Moreover, Americans were not blind and they saw the way propaganda was used by fascists, Nazis and communists. None of these groups were liked by Americans and in the minds of many Americans a negative connection existed between propaganda and those parties.11
The propagandists faced a tough task. Their job was to propagandize a people that distrusted propaganda, with a government that did not fully support them, while also remaining faithful to their own ideals.
10
Winkler, Politics, 1-37. Rhodes, Propaganda, 139-176.
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 17-47.
Colin Shindler, Hollywood Goes to War: Films and American Society 1939-1952 (London 1979) 26-32. Lewis Jacobs, ‘World War II and the American Film’, Cinema Journal Vol 7, Winter (1967) 1-21. Kaplan and Blakley, Warners’ War, 61-70.
Robert MacDougall, ‘Red, Brown and Yellow Perils: Images of the American Enemy in the 1940s and 1950s’, The Journal of Popular Culture Volume 32, Issue 4 (Spring 1999) 59-73.
Doris Milberg, World War II on the Big Screen: 450+ Films, 1938-2008 (Jefferson 2010) 7-14. O’Neill, Democracy, 105-152, 247-266.
11
Which American government organizations were
responsible for propaganda?
The Office of War Information was the most important domestic American propaganda organization during the war, but it was not the first. The first organization established to influence the American people was founded before the United States entered the war. This was the Office of Government Reports (OGR), which was led by Lowell Mellett and established in September 1939 as the successor to the public information programs of the New Deal years. It had a variety of tasks related to information, but its most important task in this context was to provide the public with information about the activities of various government agencies. This was a fairly innocuous task, but it nevertheless drew the ire of Republicans, isolationists, Republican isolationists and the press who liked to call it the OGRE. It never became a propaganda agency of any real worth, keeping its work limited to passing out small amounts of information to the public.12
The Division of Information of the Office of Emergency Management (OEM), which was established in March 1941 and led by Robert Horton, was slightly more successful. This was a defense initiative that sought to organize the stories that the different defense branches wanted to tell to the public. It was hamstrung because the president was reluctant to work with it and because its information releases conflicted with those of the Army and the Navy. Despite this reluctance Roosevelt realized that he needed to do something with propaganda and he embraced a policy of giving the public the (presumably) unembellished facts about the war and the American government’s response to it. To do this, he established the Office of Facts and Figures (OFF) in October 1941, which would be led by Archibald Macleish. According to Roosevelt, its purpose was ‘to facilitate a widespread and accurate understanding of the status and progress of the national defense effort (…) and activities of the Government.’13 It went to lengths to convince the press that it was not a propaganda agency, but that it wanted to provide truth and facts. However, like
12
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81. Winkler, Politics, 8-37.
O’Neill, Democracy, 247-266.
Clayton R. Koppes, ‘What to Show the World: The Office of War Information and Hollywood, 1942-1945’ The Journal of American History Vol. 64, No. 1. (June 1977) 87-105.
13
Winkler, Politics, 23. O’Neill, Democracy, 247-266.
the other predecessors of the Office of War Information it proved to be ineffective and unpopular. What it put out was dull and unconvincing and it lacked the authority to convince the rest of the government to support it.14
In addition to these domestic efforts there also were several efforts set up that sought to propagandize abroad such as the Office of the Coordinator of Inter-American Affairs (OCCCRBAR) led by Nelson Rockefeller and established in August 1940 which aimed at Latin-America and actually enjoyed some success. There also was the work of Colonel William G. ‘Wild Bill’ Donovan who became the head of the Office of the Coordinator of Information (COI) that was established in July 1941, and whose work focused more on subversion and psychological warfare. The Foreign Information Service (FIS) was set up in August 1941 and was led by Robert Sherwood who worked under Donovan. In contrast to the COI, the FIS operated strictly within the limits of the law. However, these information programs also encountered problems which, together with the problems of the domestic branches, convinced the Bureau of the Budget in February 1942 that a solution was needed. 15
The Bureau of the Budget commissioned a survey that was led by Milton S. Eisenhower. This found the current conditions unsatisfactory, but advised against setting up a central organization such as Creel had controlled. Despite this, the Bureau of the Budget requested that a central office be founded, with the help of Robert Sherwood who also served as Roosevelt’s speechwriter. Roosevelt was reluctant and the OCCCRBAR and the COI did not want to be included in this initiative but on June 13, 1942 the executive order was signed for a central Office of War Information (OWI) that would consolidate the activities of the other offices. It was to be led by radio commentator and journalist Elmer Davis and was to be responsible for both domestic and overseas propaganda, barring Latin America.16
14
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81. Winkler, Politics, 8-37.
O’Neill, Democracy, 247-266.
15
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81. Winkler, Politics, 8-37.
Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105.
16
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81. Winkler, Politics, 8-37.
Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105.
Franklin D. Roosevelt, ‘Executive Order 9182 Establishing the Office of War Information’, June 13, 1942. Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley ed. The American Presidency Project (28 April 2015)
The domestic duties of the Office of War Information were as follows:
Formulate and carry out, through the use of press, radio, motion picture and other facilities, information programs designed to facilitate the development of an informed and intelligent understanding (…) of the status and progress of the war effort and of the war policies, activities and the aims of the government. Coordinate the war informational activities of all Federal departments and agencies for the purpose of assuring an accurate and consistent flow of war information to the public (…). Obtain, study and analyze information concerning the war effort and advise the agencies concerned with the dissemination of such information as to the most appropriate and effective means of keeping the public adequately and accurately informed. Review, clear and approve all proposed radio and motion picture programs sponsored by Federal departments and agencies; and serve as the central point of clearance and contact for the radio broadcasting and motion picture industries, respectively, in their relationships with federal departments and agencies concerning such government programs.17
One branch of the OWI was central for movies, which are the subject of this thesis. This was the Bureau of Motion Pictures (BMP) that was to be led by Lowell Mellett. It was set up separately from all the other offices in December 1941 on the order of Roosevelt. The BMP was a response to the movie industry’s offer of support and sought to advise Hollywood on how it could support the war effort. It became a part of the OWI in June 1942 and became one of the agency’s most important branches. Since American movies had been banned in many parts of the world, it became part of the domestic branch. Lowell Mellett employed Nelson Poynter, a former journalist colleague, to head the BMP’s liaison office and Dorothy Jones, a pioneer in film content analysis, to head its review department.18
While the OWI had more power than its predecessors, it also had its own problems. It had several conflicting tasks as it had taken over the work of its predecessors. It had to provide truthful information to the American public, but it was also supposed to secure actions by the public, such
17
Roosevelt ‘Executive Order’.
18
Winkler, Politics, 38-73.
Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105.
as enlisting or buying war bonds. It was expected to provide truthful information abroad, but it also had to provide manipulated information for the purpose of propaganda. The executive order had also left doubt about how much the American public was entitled to know. In order to provide truthful information it had to provide information given by the Army, Navy and State Department, but it had no power to demand that those organizations give any information and the amount of information those organizations preferred not to give in the name of national security was overwhelming. Had it been up to them, hardly a word would have been given to the public about losses. Even without these problems, it would have had a tough task ahead, due to the ideals of its employees.19
19
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81. Winkler, Politics, 8-37.
Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105. O’Neill, Democracy, 247-266.
Roosevelt ‘Executive Order’.
Elmer Davis, ‘Owi Has a Job’, Public Opinion Quarterly Vol. 7, No. 1 (Spring 1943) 5-14. Feller, ‘OWI’, 55-65.
What were the propagandists’ ideals?
An office or bureau without its employees is just an office. It’s nothing. The same can be said of the OWI and its branches. It was shaped by its employees and their ideals and they were the ones who made it into what it was. It was overwhelmingly liberal for its time and staunchly in the camp of New Dealers. Elmer Davis, the head of the OWI, was an anti-fascist and former isolationist turned interventionist. Robert Sherwood and Archibald Macleish, the heads of the foreign and domestic branches respectively, were both literary figures of note, dedicated anti-fascists, interventionists and strong believers in the use of propaganda. Lowell Mellett and Nelson Poynter were both interventionist New Dealers; and Poynter certainly was not recruited for his experience with movies, having admitted that he had barely seen any before his appointment. While I have not seen any evidence of her admitting it, one can deduce from her postwar activities that Dorothy Jones also shared their political convictions. The strict Ulric Bell, the BMP’s strongman, was also a committed liberal interventionist. One exception was Gardner Cowles Jr. a moderate Republican publisher recruited to give the OWI some bipartisan representation. Besides these men and woman in important positions, most of its workforce also consisted of known intellectuals, political activists, artists and others with liberal convictions.20
While their liberalism can be confirmed by many sources, it is rather meaningless to call them liberal without explicitly describing what this entails. Fortunately the OWI propagandists provided enough clarity on what it entails. The men and women of the OWI and its branches had two goals for the war. They wanted to actively assist in winning the war and they wanted to lay the foundations for a better postwar world. The second goal is where their ideals can be seen. The one thing that the OWI employees made clear at the beginning was that they wanted to tell the truth. Elmer Davis made this clear when he took office:21
20
Winkler, Politics, 8-37.
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81. Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105.
Feller, ‘OWI’, 55-65 .
21
Winkler, Politics, 1-7, 38-72.
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-112, 278-328.
Locke, Racial Stigma on the Hollywood Screen From World War II to the Present: The Orientalist Buddy Film (New York 2009) 15-36.
‘This is a people’s war, and to win it the people should know as much about it as they can. This office will do its best to tell the truth and nothing but the truth, both at home and abroad. Military information that will aid the enemy must be withheld; but within that limitation we shall try to give the people a clear, complete and accurate picture.’22
The propagandists believed strongly in democracy and were opposed to negotiating with the Japanese and the Germans. They supported the policy of unconditional surrender that President Roosevelt preached. They believed strongly in national unity, and wanted to see all races, creeds and ethnicities coming together, they also wanted to see labor and capital uniting. All races, of course, also included those that could be considered the enemy, and thus they, also wanted the Japanese to eventually share in this new world. Besides this rather idealistic reason for fighting to improve portrayal of the Japanese, there were also some more practical reasons. The first was the issue of the Japanese Americans who would have to be resettled after the war, and second was the need to understand the enemy. If the enemy was not understood, and was not portrayed as a formidable but equal foe in propaganda, but was rather viewed as either a weakling or a superman, this would hurt the war effort. They saw the war as a People’s war, in which everyone came together to fight evil and the ideology of fascism. Roosevelt had proclaimed that the war was being fought for the Four Freedoms, namely, ‘freedom of speech and worship and freedom from want and fear. ‘The OWI fully supported this, and propagandized for them even when the rest of the government pulled back from its extravagant claim. They saw the postwar world as a new world, in which the Four Freedoms would be shared by everyone, including the defeated Axis powers. This was a People’s War in which they believed everyone, even the civilians of the opposing governments, should unite in order to fight against the fascist for a new, democratic world. This was the reason why they believed in unconditional surrender; because if the enemy could demand conditions then fascism would be able to live on. They believed that this was not a national, class or race war, but rather a people’s struggle. They sincerely believed that everyone had a stake in the war, and that an allied victory would bring a decent standard of living to all, including jobs, good housing, recreation, health services and old-age pensions. Everyone, including
22
minorities would enjoy the right to participate in government. In short, the propagandists of the OWI believed in a worldwide New Deal.23
In the case of the movie industry, the OWI actually published a document that clearly stated their ideals and how they should be translated onto the screen. This ‘Government Information Manual for the Motion Picture Industry’, assembled by Poynter and his staff in June 1942 and updated throughout the war, provides a comprehensive statement of the OWI’s vision of America, the war and the world as it should be applied in movies (or ‘motion pictures’ as they called them). It provides a very good reflection of their vision of how the entertainment industry should act, and how their ideals should be made visible in the movies.24
This manual, and with it the OWI, assumed three basic facts. Firstly that the overwhelming majority of the people are behind the government in its war program, but that they do not have adequate knowledge and understanding of the program. The OWI does not want blind followers, but a public that thinks and understands the program and then willingly makes the required sacrifices. They have faith that if the public is told the truth that it will then do whatever it can to support the democracy in its fight. Secondly, they believe that the people are intelligent and support an intelligent program so that the people will in turn support an intelligent war program of decency, integrity, idealism and enlightened selfishness (self-interest). Lastly, they believe that only the ignorant, frustrated, poverty-stricken and reactionary men of wealth support fascism and that with adequate effort the ignorance, frustrations and wants of those groups can be overcome.25 What they say in their opening statements already indicates the great amount of
23
Winkler, Politics, 1-7, 38-72.
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-112, 278-328. Locke, Racial, 15-36.
Harry Amana, ‘The Art of Propaganda: Charles Alston’s World War II Editorial Cartoons for the Office of War Information and the Black Press’, American Journalism, 21(2) (2004) 79-108.
William L. Bird, JR and Harry R. Rubenstein, Design for Victory: World War II Posters On The American Home Front (New York 1998) 69-82.
Milberg, World War II, 28-37.
Walter Wanger, ‘OWI and the Motion Pictures’, Public Opinion Quarterly, Vol. 7 No. 1 (Spring 1943) 100-110.
Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105.
Office of War Information and Bureau of Motion Pictures, “They” got the Blame: Fact Sheet No.5 (1942). Davis, ‘OWI Job’, 5-14.
Feller, ‘OWI’, 55-65 .
24
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-112, 223-277. Locke, Racial, 15-36.
Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105.
25
Office of War Information and Bureau of Motion Pictures, Government Information Manual for the Motion Picture Industry, (1942) 4-5.
idealism found in the OWI. They clearly believed in an intelligent American people, who when presented with the truth would make the right choice and support democracy no matter the cost.26
Looking further into the manual one discovers further clarification of the OWI ideals. Chapter I is on ‘The Issues’ and describes what the OWI perceives as the reasons why the American public should be and are fighting the war. This explanation is accompanied by three different quotations from President Roosevelt that express great admiration from the OWI for his proclaimed ideals. The manual starts with the logical and proclaims that they are fighting for survival as a nation. It states that, while some might not understand that the actual existence of the United States of America as a politically independent state depends on winning the war, they certainly believe that it does. The second reason that the manual cites is that they are fighting for freedom and against slavery, bringing the Four Freedoms quote from Roosevelt to the forefront. They want to make it very clear that the Four Freedoms is something that impacts every single person in the world, while also making it clear that an Axis victory would mean that the Four Freedoms would disappear. The third reason focuses on the post-war beliefs of the OWI. They claim that they are fighting for a New World. They see this very idealistically, arguing that a victory would bring a more decent world, free from force and militarism for all people and for future generations. It would enable a world community dedicated to the free flow of trade, ideas and culture. The ‘they’ that is spoken of here can be assumed to refer not just the OWI or those making the propaganda movies, but to ‘the people’. The chapter ends by providing some almost unusable suggestions for subjects to be dramatized for use in movies by the Hollywood men for whom this document was made. A few of the more workable ones were adapted, but were not generally well received by the general public if they were the focus of a movie. The suggestions in this chapter include showing the people (labor, management and agriculture) coming together to win the war, showing the evolution of the American way of life, showing minorities such as the ‘negroes’ improving their life thanks to democracy, showing the country as a melting pot with the people of many races and creeds living together and fighting alongside each other while their contributions are recognized and finally showing what is at stake, why people fight. As will be seen later, the suggestion that America be portrayed as a melting pot was the best suggestion and was generally
26
adapted by the Hollywood men. Many war movies featured religiously and ethnically diverse men fighting together.27
Chapter II of the manual deals with presentation of the enemy and how they should be understood. Here one can see that the OWI did not think of the enemy as the people, or even their leaders; rather the enemy was ‘his philosophies, objectives and tactics’. The manual once again expresses their viewpoint in three points. First, it states the enemy is not Hitler, Mussolini or the Japanese Warlords (note that the Japanese leadership is not referred to by name) and that neither their defeat nor a negotiated peace would really win the war for the United Nations. The second point explains their enemies’ objectives. Their objective is not geographical expansion, but rather for a small faction of rulers to conquer and exploit the peoples and resources of the world and to take away their democratic freedoms. The third point harkens back to their ideal of unity. They believe that the enemies’ tactic is to divide and conquer people along racial, religious, economic and political lines by way of psychological warfare, distortion of the truth and Fifth Column tactics. This chapter also provides suggestions for subjects that they believe lend themselves to dramatization, such as the cruelty, the cynicism, the disregard for human rights of the enemy, together with the fact that while the enemy (in this case Japan) is powerful, they are not invincible. Despite trying to encourage Hollywood to provide a balanced view of the enemy, they already fall into the trap of putting Japan on unequal ground with their fellow white enemies. Why not refer to Emperor Hirohito or Hideki Tojo by name, as they do with Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini? This implies an unequal relation, and the word warlord specifically indicates a certain backwardness. The OWI ideals are against racist portrayals in Hollywood movies, but the OWI itself is not innocent of this.28
The third chapter is not particularly interesting for the most part, and focuses on advising that Hollywood movies should showcase the Allied nations. It does, however, provide interesting points in the dramatization suggestions. While it does not say so directly, it certainly suggests that the faults of their allies should be ignored in the name of unity. British Imperialism and Soviet Communism should be ignored in favor of portraying the heroic fights of the Russian and British
27
OWI and BMP, Manual, 6-12. Locke, Racial, 15-36.
Jacobs ‘World War 2’, 1-21.
28
peoples. However, it does show some foresight with the message that Americans should stop looking down on China, as they believe it will soon be a world power.29
The remaining chapters of the manual do not contain much relevant information. They focus on the home front, the fact that there is a total war going on and the moral realities of that war which comes down to showing the reality of battle. The main message is that movies should show the people uniting to fight together in the war both at home and abroad. Hollywood should show the war as it really is, rather than coated in melodrama or merely as a sideline show to a comedy. After this, the manual provides fourteen different fact sheets that are intended to give Hollywood more information on subjects such as the War Transportation service, the Home Front, the Black Market and the Red Cross and were inserted at a later date. It is worth noting that the version of the manual I read was from 1942 and that there were updated versions released. One of those apparently spelled out more clearly that the war was not being fought against the Japanese as a race, but against the system of fascism although this was already clear from the subtext.30
The ideals presented here were not a constant for the OWI. Over time, a faction of men who came from the advertising industry and worked in the Bureau of Campaigns gained influence. This led to a decline in the idealistic content of the propaganda in favor of content that was more goal-oriented and relied on emotions, leading to some of the more idealistic members resigning. The OWI was also attacked in 1943 by Roosevelt’s opponents in Congress for what they felt was its unfair support for Roosevelt’s fourth term as President and various government proposals that had not yet passed through Congress but were already being promoted by the OWI. Southern democrats also joined these attacks as they disliked the OWI for its idealism and support of non-whites, specifically African Americans. Roosevelt did not help the organization and Congress succeeded in cutting the domestic budget by 40%, initially to 5,500,000 dollars, and a little later to 2,750,000 dollars. After this many more of the OWI’s idealistic members left, including Poynter and Mellett. The OWI’s staff was reduced from 1300 employees to only 495 employees. Several of the former employees did help to set up private initiatives to help propagandize the war effort, such as the Hollywood Writers Mobilization and the Writers’ War Board. 31
29
OWI and BMP, Manual, 22-31.
30
OWI and BMP, Manual, 32-167.
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 248-277.
31
Winkler, Politics, 38-72.
Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105. Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 113-141.
What was the situation in Hollywood when the Bureau
of Motion Pictures was established?
It needs to be made clear that the OWI did not need to convince Hollywood,32 or the majority of Americans, to help support the war effort. Rather, the OWI needed to inform Hollywood and the American people on how to help support the war effort. Many Hollywood stars joined war bond rallies, or toured around the military bases and hospitals giving shows. Some signed up for the army, including the director Frank Capra. They also established the Hollywood Canteen where members of the armed forces could enjoy free food and drinks, while being served and entertained by celebrities. A War Activities Committee was also set up to aid cooperation with the government. This chapter aims to provide some insight into the situation of Hollywood, and to show that, while the BMP certainly influenced Hollywood, Hollywood did not need convincing. Hollywood wanted to help and some of its top men were great supporters of the war effort. This is not to say that everyone in Hollywood was a supporter of the war from the very start. Especially before the United States of America entered the war officially, there were many who preferred to avoid controversy and war is controversial. They were helped by Will H. Hays’ enforcement of the Motion Picture Production Code, which actively targeted movies deemed controversial, including: movies that touched, even slightly, upon the war that was being waged in Europe.33
Some Hollywood men went beyond the call of duty in order to support the war effort. One of these was Walt Disney, who himself approached various defense and industry officials with offers of help. No Americans took him up on his offer at first, but after they saw the success of the cartoons he did for the Canadian government they gladly asked for his help. During the war, the Disney studio helped to create large numbers of training films, military insignias and propaganda films for the government and related military industries, without any prompting for the OWI. One
O’Neill, Democracy, 129-152.
32
The term Hollywood, as used in this thesis, refers not to the geographical location of Hollywood but rather to the community of people that make up the American motion picture industry.
33
Milberg, World War II, 38-55, 90-95. O’Neill, Democracy, 129-152, 247-266.
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, vii-x, 17-47. Kaplan and Blakley, Warners’ War, 27-37.
Martin Quigley, ‘Mellett Frames New list of Picture War Themes’, Motion Picture Herald, November 28, 1942, 16
example of his work is the The New Spirit (War Activities Committee, January 1942) propaganda movie he made for the Treasury Department. It proved to be very popular with the public, but, much like the OWI, it received backlash from Congress because it was seen as a waste of money. While this was not related to the OWI, the Disney studio also did propaganda work for the OCCCRBAR for Latin America as well as various shorts on the enemy, such as Der Fuehrer’s Face (RKO, January 1943).34
The Disney studio was not the only one that actively supported the fight against the Nazis. The Warner Brothers’ studio had pushed for interventionism before the war and was one of the few studios that did not cower in the face of Hitler’s threats. Many studios preferred to stay away from serious war subjects before the United States became actively involved in the war. This was due to fear that they would be shut out of lucrative markets and that there would be reprisals against European Jews, although the excuse of fairness was also often used. Warner Brothers bravely forged ahead, mainly due to one of the Warner Brothers, Harry Warner, who had toured Europe and seen fascism firsthand, an experience that had left him a dedicated anti-fascist. Being Jewish himself, the way his own employees had been treated in Germany due to anti-Semitism made a great impression on him. He convinced the other Warner Brothers to support him in his fight against fascism and in his attempts to convince to rest of Hollywood to follow suit. While most of Hollywood did not initially join him, the Warner Brothers studio made films such as Confessions of
a Nazi Spy (Warner Brothers, May 1939). This was the first openly anti-Nazi movie from a major
Hollywood studio. It was called propaganda by many of its critics, but Harry Warner did not see it as propaganda but rather as his obligation which he undertook on a voluntary basis with no help or suggestions from the government. He said that he just told the truth and that he wanted the Warner Brothers studio make movies that accurately represent world affairs. Together with Darryl Zanuck and Samuel Goldwyn, Harry Warner was also one of the major financial contributors to the Fight for Freedom Committee that advocated interventionism and besides the case of a single movie that will be examined later, he and Warner Brothers were a major ally for the BMP. They
34
A. Bowdoin Van Riper, Learning from Mickey, Donald and Walt: Essays on Disney’s Edutainment Films (Jefferson 2011) 15-78.
Shale, Donald Duck, 1-96. Milberg, World War II, 80-89. Rhodes, Propaganda, 139-176.
fought to keep Hollywood making movies that would educate the masses on the needs of the war and what was important in the war:35
35
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 17-112. Jacobs ‘World War 2’, 1-21.
Kaplan and Blakley, Warners’ War, 2-5, 27-70. Rhodes, Propaganda, 139-176.
How were the Japanese generally thought of during
the war?
It is easy to say that Japanese enemies were poorly portrayed in propaganda, but it is also important to know how they were generally thought of. While American culture divided Germans into Good Germans and Bad Germans (also known as Nazis), the Japanese were just seen as bad. They were rarely seen as individuals and were frequently portrayed as animals. Comparisons between Japanese and various species of monkeys were common and appeared in many movies. The Japanese were frequently portrayed as vermin to be exterminated, especially towards the end of the war. While an association with an animal is not always bad, consider the lion or the eagle. The fact is that the Japanese were always associated with stupid, bestial and pestilent animals. In contrast, such as association was rare for the Germans. Pulitzer Prize winning historian, Allan Nevins, said after the war that: ‘no foe has been so detested as were the Japanese.’36 The reason for this was partly due to their portrayal during the war and partly their own actions. They were portrayed as uncommonly treacherous and savage, a portrayal that was not helped by the fact that Pearl Harbor was seen by many as a dishonorable betrayal. The way the Japanese treated their prisoners, and the fact that they fought in the jungles (which were associated with savageness) rather than in the civilized European cities, certainly did not help. Japanese reliance on charges and ambush tactics was also generally despised, even though the Americans did the very same thing and were portrayed as heroic for doing so in their own movies. The Japanese propaganda also liked to stress the unity of the Japanese people, portraying them as a hundred million hearts beating as one. This concept of a mass was popularly interpreted in the West as suggesting that the Japanese lacked individuality. This became twisted into a view that saw them as a mass of bees or ants namely, as insects to be crushed. Sometimes the Americans could not decide on the portrayal of the Japanese. Whether they were subhuman or superhuman was a point of contention, especially near the start of the war. Many felt that a non-white person could not possibly be a real threat. Even when they had struck at Pearl Harbor this was dismissed as actually being the work of the Germans, with the Japanese seen as mere puppets. The quantity of slurs used for the Japanese was massive. In films made during the war that feature Germans, slurs such as Gerry or Kraut were oddly enough rare. However, insults such as monkey, ape, rising son,
36
John W. Dower, War Without Mercy: Race and Power in the Pacific War (New York 1986) 33.
John A. Lynn, Battle: A History of Combat and Culture: The Patterns of War Since the Eighteenth Century (Philadelphia 2008) 219-231.
rat or the ever-present ‘Jap’ however were common. But after the war this all disappeared surprisingly quickly as the evil monkeys became America’s little monkey buddy.37
The Leatherneck issue of September 1945. It did not take long to change the image from Japan as evil monkeys and pests, to a little monkey buddy.38
37
Dower, War, 1-93, 118-180.
38
Wartime Press, The Leatherneck 1945 09’ (Version 5 May 2015) http://www.wartimepress.com/archive-publication.asp?TID=The%20Leatherneck%201945%2009&MID=Leatherneck&q=6872&FID=66 (5 May 2015).
How did the propagandists of the Office of War
Information work with Hollywood?
The government propagandists’ work in Hollywood started with Lowell Mellett. He was appointed as the coordinator of government films by Roosevelt on December 17, 1941, shortly after Pearl Harbor (December 7). The executive order by Roosevelt that appointed him read that ‘motion pictures could be one of the most effective tools in “informing” the public.’39 As he was still part of the OGR at the time he created a sub-bureau called the Bureau of Motion Pictures. In April 1942 he set up an office to handle liaison duties and appointed Nelson Poynter as its head. This office was responsible both for overseeing the (few) war related films that the government made and for liaising with Hollywood in order to guide the Hollywood studios in aiding the war effort. Mellett made a deal with Hollywood. His office would be the clearing house for all dealings between the movie studios and the government and in return the government would respect the commercial interests of the movie studios. Thus there was cooperation, but no interference with the box office. This provided more freedom than most entertainment industries got. The government needed Hollywood, but they realized that too much propaganda would wreck the entertainment appeal of the movies. If the movies became unattractive for moviegoers this would result in no audience for the propaganda and no profits for the filmmakers. This was important for the Hollywood executives, who were fine with cooperating, but did not want to lose their profits. This was particularly so given that they had already lost a large part of the foreign market with the entrance of the USA into the war, making what’s left for possible profit avenues even more important.40
In June 1942, soon after the inception of Mellett’s office, the Office of War Information was created, and Mellett’s office became a part of it. They saw that Hollywood certainly was happily making war related movies, such as True to the Army (Paramount, March 1942), Menace of the
Rising Sun (Universal, April 1942), Secret Agent of Japan (Twentieth Century-Fox, April 1942), Remember Pearl Harbor (Republic, May 1942), Danger in the Pacific (Universal, June 1942), A
39
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 56
40
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81. Locke, Racial, 15-36.
Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105. Shindler, Films, 38-56.
Prisoner of Japan (PRC, July 1942), Halfway to Shanghai (Universal, September 1942), The Devil With Hitler (Hal Roach, October 1942), The Daring Young Man (Columbia, October 1942), The Yanks Are Coming (PRC, November 1942) and Star Spangled Rhythm (Paramount, December
1942). However, the BMP analysts concluded that these movies would not help to win the war at all. Dorothy Jones concluded that the films failed to give a true picture of the war. They missed everything that would help the OWI to explain the war to the people and a serious treatment of the war issues was nearly nonexistent. These movies used the war as a stage or wartime set but in the OWI’s opinion, they failed to use it in for any useful propaganda purposes. They adapted old spy or gangster movies and switched the antagonists for Nazis or Japanese without actually changing the plot. The Japanese were depicted as ‘fiendish and diabolical’, and as engaging in sadistic cruelty for no other reason but to satisfy their bloodlust. The enemy was portrayed as useless and ineffective and able to be defeated by a single hard-boiled hero. Furthermore, the Chinese were portrayed as silly and ridiculous. Many films perpetuated the ‘stab-in-the-back’ thesis which concluded that the only reason why America was at war was because it had been attacked by the Japanese. This did not fit with the OWI’s idealistic idea that the USA had entered the war to improve the world and to fight against fascist ideals. Nelson Poynter concluded that the studios needed some serious coaching. They set out to discuss feature pictures with the industry using the OWI’s themes, made lists available for consultation on all pictures, preached daily the gospel of the OWI ideals and made it clear that they were there to help and not to control.41
The Hollywood men had been willing to listen to BMP advice regarding short movies, but they feared that incorporating government messages into feature films would hurt their profits. They were also afraid that the BMP would censor their movies if it became too involved in them. Considering the role that the Hays office had played, this was possibly somewhat ridiculous. Moreover, the BMP had no intention of censoring the movies as this would take away their entertainment value and therefore reduce their effectiveness as propaganda. Poynter began courting the Hollywood men in May 1942 in the in order to create better Hollywood propaganda. First, he convinced them that he did not have the power to censor, nor would he try to do that. He then asked them to incorporate OWI themes into their feature films and asked them if the BMP could review voluntarily sent scripts before production began, so that they could help. Poynter
41
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81, 248-277. Shindler, Films, 38-56.
Milberg, World War II, 38-79.
Lowell Mellett, Lowell Mellett Explains History of the Bureau of Motion Pictures, NARA II, College Park, MD ed. Hollywood Goes to War (1942) http://marb.kennesaw.edu/hollywoodandwar/items/show/76. 1-6.
started encouraging them to casually insert propaganda into the movies. This included things like uniformed women in crowd scenes, teenagers participating in war activities such as collecting scrap in the background, the set displaying war posters and so on. He wanted to make the war pervasive in the films, showing everyone participating. The fact that not everyone participated in these activities did not matter, as the OWI wanted an ideal America to be portrayed in which everyone played their part. He suggested and received ideas for movies in meetings with the studio heads. These included the evacuation of the Japanese Americans from the West Coast and the account of a U.S. Ambassador that was sent to the Soviet Union. The first of these suggestions was to later bring forth quite a lot resentment from the BMP when it was released. One movie that was used as an example for other movies to emulate was Mrs. Miniver (MGM, June 1942) a film in which the various classes in England united together for the war. As discussed earlier, Poynter and his staff assembled the Government Information Manual for the Motion Picture Industry in order to help the Hollywood executives create the correct presentation of their subjects in movies. They also asked film makers to consider seven questions:42
1. Will this picture help win the war?
2. What war information problem does it seek to clarify, dramatize or interpret?
3. If it is an “escape” picture, will it harm the war effort by creating a false picture of America, her allies, or the world we live in?
4. Does it merely use the war as the basis for a profitable picture, contributing nothing of real significance to the war effort and possibly lessening the effect of other pictures of more importance?
5. Does it contribute something new to our understanding of the world conflict and the various forces involved, or has the subject already been adequately covered?
42
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, viii-x 48-81, 248-277. Shindler, Films, 38-56.
Milberg, World War II, 38-55. Locke, Racial, 15-36.
OWI and BMP, Manual, 1-167.
Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105. O’Neill, Democracy, 247-266.
Jacobs ‘World War 2’, 1-21. Rhodes, Propaganda, 139-176.
6. When the picture reaches its maximum circulation on the screen, will it reflect conditions as they are and fill a need current at that time, or will it be out-dated [sic]? 7. Does the picture tell the truth or will the young people of today have reason to say they
were misled by propaganda?43
Clear evidence can be seen here of the OWI ideals, with its emphasis on educating the people and telling the truth. A reaction to the Hollywood films that had already been released can also be seen in points three and four, which bring to mind films such as Halfway to Shanghai and the musicals True to the Army, The Yanks Are Coming and Star Spangled Rhythm which ridiculed the Chinese allies and merely used the war as a background respectively.44
These measures were well received in Hollywood at the time. They publically hailed the manual and the BMP suggestions in a burst of patriotism and in appreciation of the recognition from the Government that it represented. They also gave serious consideration of the subjects presented within the manual. The opportunity to take on serious subjects was particularly appreciated among the more leftist and liberal parts of Hollywood. However, whether this would lead to the sort of movies that the OWI wanted is another matter, as can be seen in the debacle of Little
Tokyo, U.S.A.45 (Twentieth Century-Fox, August 1942).46
During World War II the American government had detained the Japanese American population and interned them in camps. This was explained either by accusing the whole population of being saboteurs and spies or by saying that it was for their own protection. Whatever the case, it was undeniable that the treatment of the Japanese American population was vastly different from the treatment of the German Americans and Italian Americans. This was despite the fact that there had been no proof of Japanese sabotage on American continental soil while there had been German sabotage. Twentieth Century-Fox was, possibly correctly, convinced that the internment would make a good subject for a serious war movie and Little Tokyo, U.S.A. was the result. It had
43
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 66-67.
44
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81. Milberg, World War II, 38-79.
45
Note that I have not seen the film myself, All information relating to this film dependent upon secondary sources.
46
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81. Shindler, Films, 38-56.
even obtained approval from the War Department’s Bureau of Public Relations before filming, which ensured that it contained nothing offensive to the Army. The Army had also cooperated by allowing filming of the actual evacuation of Japanese American citizens. But this was not enough to ensure that the OWI would think that it was a good movie. Dorothy Jones said about the film: ‘Virtually everything in it, is calculated to shiver the well-sensitized spines of the Office of War Information.’47 This it certainly did. The film presents every single Japanese American as a Fifth-Columnist, just waiting to betray the USA, thus further reinforcing the ‘stab-in-the-back’ thesis. The heroic detective who is the main character blatantly ignores the Bill of Rights, breaking and entering Japanese homes whenever he pleases, and beats up unarmed men who had already surrendered. The Japanese are all, to a man, portrayed according to oriental stereotypes. They can barely speak English, are as unified as a colony of ants and are dressed in traditional garb. The only Japanese American who is not an evil stereotype is quickly murdered and removed from the picture.48
The BMP needed to react to the film. The review staff hated the film and, while Poynter was not as apprehensive of the film as his staff had been, he still was not a fan of it. The War Relocation Authority, which was responsible for the Japanese Americans during and after the war, was not happy with the film either as it felt that it complicated their work. The decision was made to ask Twentieth Century-Fox to change certain aspects of the film, in order to ensure that the film points out that there were a large number of loyal Japanese Americans. The studio made a few of the changes suggested by the OWI, but replied saying that the film only intended to make the audience hate the disloyal Japanese and that it had already been approved by the Army. Most of the more serious changes were not made as Twentieth Century-Fox reacted with bewilderment to the commentary and refused to comply. In addition some things were also impossible to change, as the actress who had given the final speech in the movie, which the BMP had objected to, had become pregnant. It was not surprising that Twentieth Century-Fox reacted in the way it did. After
47
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 72.
48
Koppes and Black, Hollywood Goes, 48-81, 248-277. Shindler, Films, 38-56.
Koppes ‘What to Show the World’, 87-105. O’Neill, Democracy, 247-266.
MacDougall, ‘Red, Brown and Yellow’, 59-73. Milberg, World War II, 38-55.
Brian Niiya, ‘Little Tokyo U.S.A. (film)’ (version 6 May 2015),
http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Little_Tokyo_U.S.A._%28film%29/ (9 May 2015).
Allan M. Winkler, Home Front U.S.A.: America during World War II, (Arlington Heights 1986) 70-74. Fraser A. Sherman, Screen Enemies of the American Way: Political Paranoia About Nazis, Communists, Saboteurs, Terrorists and Body Snatching Aliens in Film and Television, (Jefferson 2011) 27-43.
