Details

Release year: 2012

Storyline

As the Japanese surrender at the end of World War II, General Fellers is tasked with deciding if Emperor Hirohito will be hanged as a war criminal. Influencing his ruling is his quest to find Aya, an exchange student he met years earlier in the U.S.

Top credits

Directors

Peter Webber

Writers

Cast

Matthew Fox — General Bonner Fellers
Colin Moy — General Richter
Tommy Lee Jones — General Douglas MacArthur
Eriko Hatsune — Aya Shimada

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Did you know

• The romantic story between Fellers and Aya was entirely fictional for the film. Bonner F. Fellers was married in 1925 to Dorothy Dysart who accompanied him twice on his posting to the Phillipines, and she also went with him to China and Japan.

• Aya Shimada is based on a woman, Yuri Watanabe, Bonner F. Fellers met at Earlham College in 1915. Fellers and Watanabe were lifelong friends until her death in June 1954.

• For his services, Gen.Fellers was awarded the Second Order of the Sacred Treasure. The Sacred Treasure was established in 1888 by the Emperor Meiji, who was the emperor known for forcing Japan to modernize. This award, in its present form, is similar to the Presidential Medal of Freedom in the US. Originally this honor was in eight classes of ascending importance, which bears some resemblance to the various classes of British knighthood. As of 2003 there are six classes of this honor. Of the many types of honors, the Sacred Treasure is the most awarded honor in Japan.