Escapade in Japan (1957)

This is the Japan of my early childhood memories, brought to life by this film. I was a boy of 4 when I moved to Japan in 1956, so seeing this movie which was shot at the same time I lived there was a great thrill. It was the travelogue aspect of the movie that particularly interested me: the vignette in the geisha house; the vignette in the Japanese theater;street scenes; railroad stations; etc. The plot was relatively simple. Cameron Mitchell and Theresa Wright were convincing as the worried married couple desperately trying to find their missing son. But the flattering portrayal of the Japanese people and the reverence shown for Japanese landmarks and its cultural is the real eye opener. Since it was made in 1957, I'm assuming it was to show Americans how their perceptions of the Japanese may have been wrong. I know that having there for 4 years, we couldn't have been treated more kindly than we were by our Japanese friends, neighbors, and co-workers. I thank Turner Classic Movies for showing it.

This movie is a great family movie and a trip through history when Japan was occupied by US Forces. No bad words, very little violence just two boys running away from the unknown in Post War Japan. Having grownup in Japan as Army brat during the 50's and 60's the movie rekindles memories of living in Japan while they were building their economy and maintaining their distinct culture and Identity. Its a warm hearted story of a foreign boy lost in totally different culture and country from what he knows yet accepts the friendship and assistance of a local boy as he is guided around Japan. He learns and sees things that would not have been possible had he not been crashed landed off the Japanese coast. I have watched and rewatched this movie with pleasure each time.

This film has a soft spot in me - the film was one of the first movies I ever attended in a movie house. Probably my parents took me to see it because Jon Provost was in it, and I was a fan of the series LASSIE. However it was on a double bill, and I believe it was with PETER PAN (the first Disney cartoon I saw in a movie house). I know I enjoyed it.A boy of three or four can barely remember details, but this film was very colorfully shot. It was one of a series of films of all types (SAYONARA, THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI, A MAJORITY OF ONE) where Hollywood was trying to make amends to the Japanese for the caricatures of their military and leaders that were shown in the 1940s. The plot was that Provost gets separated from his parents in an accident off Japan, and ends up with a Japanese family. Soon he is paling around with that family's son, and they are unaware of the efforts by the U.S. and Provost's family to find him. Instead, when the police seem to be trying to catch him, Provost and his friend jump to the conclusion that they've done something criminal, and they run away. The film follows their constantly just escaping the police, until the conclusion (reminiscent of the conclusion in THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING) where everyone has to rescue the boys from a roof. It was a very exciting conclusion (and the music in those last moments helped really build up the suspense). It was a good film, and a welcome introduction for the younger version of me to the pleasures of watching movies.

Young Jon Provost, later to star in "Lassie", got his first notice in this charming story of a chase in 1950's Japan. He plays the son of an American couple working in Japan who survives a airplane ditching off the coastline; he got separated from the crew, and in the fog is picked up by a fisherman.This Japanese fishing family befriends him, even though they cannot talk to him, not knowing English. The boy, however, fears he did something wrong when he sees many Japanese police searching the village. He flees, along with the slightly older son of the fisherman. Then begins the chase between the police and the American couple, and the two boys who fear the police only try to find you when you've done something wrong.The bulk of the movie is of the two boys fleeing through Japan and seeing different and interesting sights on their odyssey. It is in effect a travelogue of post-war Japan. The final scenes on top of a tall Shinto religious temple are exciting enough.Colorful, and good family fare, the film also was a clear attempt to ease hostilities between the United States and a Japan that just a decade before had been a hated enemy. They did this by showing the Japanese as human being as concerned about their missing son as the Americans were about theirs. Recommended! Give it a try if you see it.