Five movies about Pearl Harbor you shouldn’t miss

Over the years, dozens of movies and television miniseries have been produced about World War II in Europe and the Pacific, but only a handful touch upon the event that thrust the United States into the war: the attack on Pearl Harbor, 83 years ago Saturday.

We selected five movies that look at the Pearl Harbor attack and its aftermath from various points of view – American military, Japanese military, civilians on Oahu and wartime propaganda – as well as ask what would have happened if a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier had traveled through time and had been in Hawaiian waters on Dec. 7.

‘Tora! Tora! Tora!’

This movie, a joint Japanese-American production, is considered one of the most definitive – and historically accurate – portrayals of the lead-up to and the attack on Pearl Harbor. It’s unique in that the American sequences were directed by an American director, while the Japanese sequences were directed by a trio of Japanese directors. The cast features Jason Robards, Martin Balsam, James Whitmore, Joseph Cotten, E.G. Marshall and So Yamamura.

Historians and Pearl Harbor survivors alike praised the film for its accuracy, and it won the Academy Award for special effects at the 43rd Academy Awards in 1971. According to the Pearl Harbor Tours website, a 1994 survey of visitors to the Arizona Memorial showed many Americans’ knowledge of the attack came from this movie.

“Tora! Tora! Tora!” is available to rent on YouTube Premium, Apple TV and Amazon Prime.

‘From Here to Eternity’

“Soldiers finding romance and trouble in a peacetime tropical setting” is probably an oversimplified summary of “From Here to Eternity,” but for most of the movie, it’s just that. Enlisted soldiers stationed on Oahu train at the barracks, fight and drink in the bars, and fall in love along the way.

The film deals several gut punches in the boxing ring, barroom brawls and back-alley knife fights, and then knocks everyone’s lives apart with the attack on Dec. 7.

The 1953 movie featured an ensemble led by Burt Lancaster, Montgomery Clift, Frank Sinatra, Donna Reed and Deborah Kerr, and went on to win eight Oscars – including supporting actor and actress awards for Sinatra and Reed – in 1954. It also was selected for preservation in the National Film Registry by the Library of Congress in 2002.

“From Here to Eternity” is available to watch for free on Sling TV and is available to rent on Amazon Prime, Apple TV and YouTube.

‘In Harm’s Way’

Directed by legendary filmmaker Otto Preminger, “In Harm’s Way” is a fictionalized look at a group of U.S. Navy officers and how they cope with the attack on Pearl Harbor and the war in the Pacific in the months that followed.

The movie’s name, excerpted from a quote by Revolutionary War naval commander John Paul Jones, focuses on Captain Rockwell Torrey, played by John Wayne, and a handful of officers, including Kirk Douglas, who plays his executive officer whose career has stalled as his wife’s open infidelity comes to a head on Dec. 7, resulting in a downwards spiral for Douglas’ character ; Dana Andrews as a micro-managing and overly cautious admiral who butts heads with Wayne’s character; Brandon deWilde as a P.T. boat officer and Wayne’s character’s estranged son; and Patricia Neal as a divorced woman serving in the Navy’s Nurse Corps who begins a romance with Torrey during the war.

”In Harm’s Way” sets itself apart from many World War II films by painting an unflattering picture of sailors at peace and war, with plot lines focusing on infidelity, political in-fighting, alcoholism, rape and suicide between the actions at Pearl Harbor and the months that followed during the war in the Pacific.

“In Harm’s Way” is available to watch for free on Pluto TV and available to rent on Amazon Prime, YouTube and Apple TV.

‘The Final Countdown’

What if the attack on Pearl Harbor could have been prevented? That’s the premise of the 1980 military science fiction film “The Final Countdown,” which stars Kirk Douglas, Martin Sheen, James Farentino and Charles Durning.

The USS Nimitz, conducting flight operations off the coast of Hawaii, enters a vortex that transports the ship back in time to Dec. 6, 1941. As the crew begins to realize what is going on through Jack Benny radio broadcasts and reconnaissance overflights of the Japanese fleet and Pearl Harbor, the captain and his officers try to figure out whether they should launch a strike to take out the Japanese attack force and prevent the events of Dec. 7.

Whether they could do it is easily answered when a pair of F-14 Tomcats dogfight a pair of A6M Zeros, but whether they should destroy the Japanese fleet proves more difficult to answer.

Here’s a snippet of dialogue:

Captain Yelland: If the United States falls under attack, our job is to defend her in the past, present and future.

Lasky: And after that?

Captain Yelland: After that, we take our orders from the Commander in Chief of the United States Armed Forces.

Lasky: Franklin Delano Roosevelt?

“The Final Countdown” is available to watch for free on the Roku Channel, Tubi, Sling TV and with a subscription on Amazon Prime and YouTube Premium.

‘December 7th’

During World War II, many people from Hollywood joined the war effort. Ronald Reagan participated in the 1st Motion Picture Unit, which produced 400 training films during the war. Jimmy Stewart was a squadron commander flying B-24s and completed 20 combat missions over Europe. Clark Gable attended aerial gunners school and flew aboard B-17s in combat missions over Europe.

Also enlisted into the war effort was legendary filmmaker John Ford, who served as a commander in the Navy Reserve and made films about the war, including a documentary about the Battle of Midway and the propaganda film “December 7th.”

“December 7th,” released in 1943, portrays Uncle Sam, along with the rest of the city of Honolulu, sleeping peacefully on Sunday morning when waves of Japanese aircraft appear over Pearl Harbor.

What sets this film apart is that it was commissioned by the government as a propaganda war film, and the original cut was 82 minutes . Due to wartime censorship and military leaders expressing concerns about the content, some of which was dramatized, Ford cut the film down to 32 minutes, while the longer version was shelved and not released for another 50 years. The shortened version was shown to select personnel with security clearance. Ford obtained permission to submit it for consideration and subsequently won the Academy Award for Best Documentary at the 1944 Academy Awards.

The National Archives made both the edited and original version of the movie available to watch for free on YouTube.