Row breaks over planned Japanese documentary
January 19th, 2007 by Zsofia
The Chinese government has reacted angrily to a Japanese documentary in production, which describes the massacre of tens of thousands of Chinese civilians by Japanese troops as “a myth”. The highly politicised film is funded through public donations, and is directed by Satoru Mizushima, the head of a nationalist Japanese TV channel, Sakura.
The documentary apparently insist that the 1937 Nanjing massacre never took place, despite historical evidence that Japanese troops slaughtered at least 142,000 people when they invaded the city which was then capital of nationalist China. (Chinese historians have put the death toll at 300,000 men, women and children.)
“The Truth About Nanjing” is only one of the many films set for release this year, the 70th anniversary of the massacre. The Nanjing story also featured at Sundance this year, through a critically-acclaimed US production with Woody Harrelson. The Chinese government also plans to make its own version of the film, based on Iris Chang’s bestselling book, The Rape of Nanjing.
