Tom Hanks's best movie.
Posted on 03/06/2010 10:05:05 AM PST by jimbo123
To the young Tom Hanks, history was as dull as an algebra equation. For Hanks — a classic baby boomer, born in 1956 — World War II was just a string of long-ago muzzle flashes in black-and-white. Yet he did have a more direct connection to the global cataclysm. His father had been a U.S. Naval mechanic (second class) in World War II. But Amos Hanks wasn't the type to tell his son tales of bravery and sacrifice. "Growing up, I always knew Dad was somewhere in the Pacific fixing things," Hanks says. "He had nothing nice to say about the Navy. He hated the Navy. He hated everybody in the Navy. He had no glorious stories about it."
-snip-
Back in World War II, we viewed the Japanese as 'yellow, slant-eyed dogs' that believed in different gods. They were out to kill us because our way of living was different. We, in turn, wanted to annihilate them because they were different. Does that sound familiar, by any chance, to what's going on today?"
(Excerpt) Read more at time.com ...
What is a “Tom Hanks”?
“Looks like Hanks is beginning to actually live the part he played in Forrest Gump. MEGA TWIT!!”
Nah, the character Forrest Gump was a hell of a lot smarter.
He should have stuck to the goofy movies like "The Money Pit" and "Splash".
I think he (and we) would be a lot happier with him not taking himself so seriously.
I wonder if Tom will make any reference to the game Japanese soldiers would play with babies in China, the Philippines and elsewhere, by throwing them up in the air and trying to skewer them with the bayonet on their rifle. I'm sure he'll spend a sufficient amount of time explaining the horrors endured in the Changi POW camp. Hanks is a scumbag.
There's a 1980 movie called "The Final Countdown" in which the USS Nimitz is time warped back to December 6, 1941. Charles Durning plays a US Senator who is rescued at sea and brought aboard the Nimitz and asks that very question, "What is a US Navy ship doing named after a serving Admiral?" The story line is kind of hoakey, but like "Top Gun" a few years later, was a good show of US Navy firepower.
Had it not been for the A-Bomb, there's a good chance the USS Coral Sea would have played a role. It along with the Midway and FDR were a new class of super-carriers that totally outclassed the Essex class flat tops that carried the bulk of the war in the Pacific, and arrived just a little too late. Like the A1 Skyraider they were to carry, they all proved their worth well into the Viet Nam war and beyond.
This may explain Hank's confusion.
I wonder if there'll be any references to Admiral Kirk Douglas in his upcoming miniseries?
Tom Hanks's best movie.
I just don't see how any history of the Pacific war would be complete without some mention of his harpooning the giant squid after being shanghaied by the Nautilus...
Hanks is quite involved in the National WW2 museum that is located here in New Orleans. He was recently in the city to screen a preview of the HBO miniseries The Pacific. He is the executive producer. There was a reception after at the National World War II Museum.
He also narrates a documentary on the war that plays daily at the museum.
http://www.nola.com/movies/index.ssf/2009/11/world_war_ii_museums_beyond_al.html
None of this means that he is an expert on the war, but I thought I would post this as a point of interest to the thread subject.
Hollywood Courage: Tom Hanks Fawns Over Obama, Slams Fox News on…MSNBC
For all those recent historians, back in the late 30s and early 40’s the American forecast was nowhere certain.
Most people paid more attention to Germany for the first part of WWII, because of the American policy of Germany first, but many quickly forget that Dec 7, 1941, wasn’t just a US/Japan strategy.
Within that same month, Japan had launched a seven pronged thrust throughout the east. Insofar as the projection of power was concerned, immediately after Pearl Harbor, Japan controlled over 1/2 of the world’s surface, from India to the west coast of the Americas and it was in no ways certain they weren’t about to invade the Americas.
Immediately after Pearl Harbor, there were no British or American ships patrolling either the Pacific or Indian Oceans, leaving 1/2 the world’s surface open to Japanese attack.
Not to mention that the first Little League outside of Pennsylvania was founded in New Jersey in 1947 . . .
Really? Wow. I had no idea. Where can I read more about that? I had the privilege of listening to the REAL Jim Lovell speak in the media tent at Oshkosh a few years back. He spoke more of general aviation than space - a really delightful man.
HaNKS: Yet another Hollywood idiot whose films I won’t be spending my money on no matter how “good” they are. STFU you moron!
Some sort of a Wanking Tool! ;^}
I can’t believe that at one time I actually thought that he might have a few conservative leanings. It seems that I was waaaaaaaaaay off the mark with that!
They also knew their place.
They also knew their place.
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