rncolbath I have avoided foreign films due subtitles all my 58 years, no more, films with them are as good as movies you don't need them for, don't be turned off due subtitles, "Yamato" ranks up there with Anne Frank's Diary, if your History oriented, this is my 1st subtitle film I watched straight threw, I now have seven others lined up to watch and will watch having gotten over the stigma of subs, if you felt some thing for Anne Franks story, please, please give in to this movie, you will not in any way be turned off due the subtitles unless your still stigmatized with the fact of reading and understanding what your watching, very few places in this one are you over whelmed with reading to understand, a very meaningful true or based on a true story movie, a very much must watch

wanderingstar I am almost through a great book on the history of Japan in WWII. The naval battles are fascinating to read about, and so when I saw this movie in the local Asian mall I picked it up.Yamato (the old name for Japan) has good and bad points. Starting with the good - I find the story fascinating, how the remainder of the Second fleet made a run for Okinawa on a mission that everyone knew was suicide due to lack of air support (Japan's air force had been finally crushed at Saipan). Some of the acting was great; I thought Uchida really stood out. As far as I can tell the film was very historically accurate. Some of the insights into "bushido" were interesting, especially the admiral's explanation of bushido vs. English chivalry. And some of the effects were pretty good too.On the bad side... the film had kind of a made-for-TV movie feel. As I said, some of the effects were good, others were far from great. The director shied away from showing the large sections of the ship, or the whole ship, maybe because of lack of budget - but I found myself really wanting to see those shots of this 65,000 ton superbattleship. It was obvious the whole film was made in a studio. They really should have invested in substantial steel tubes for the anti-aircraft guns, the fact that they jittered around like toys bothered me. Also in the silent dialog scenes, there should have been an omnipresent rumble of the ship's engines to add to the illusion that we are on the largest battleship in the world.It wasn't great, but I enjoyed it anyway, and anyone else who is interested in Japanese naval history I think will also enjoy it despite its shortcomings.

terrencegraham1 ... but dumuel's critic i could use to comment mostly of the war movies form USA... The movie try to touch the conscience of the Japanese, make them remember what their fathers and grandfathers has to do... war is not a "good guy vs bad guy" thing... both have villains and heroes....... i'm agree, the FX's are not so good than a Hollywood movie, but is a very strong story... normal people confronting the horror of war, their feelings about the honor, patriotism, and different ways to facing death; there's no silly's love stories, or super pilots fighting alone the Americans, politic is out, the human beings are the protagonist of the movie... like some said "pearl harbor sucks", and "Yamato" is excellent!

thewakinghour I was prepared to watch, and be annoyed at, a typical sentimentally self-justifying movie about the brave and suffering Japanese, unfortunate victims in a war foisted upon them, ala nearly every TV drama I have ever seen touching on the war here in Japan. And, to some degree, this is such a movie.That criticism noted, the film does not shirk much, certainly no more than some Hollywood Spielberg vehicle, from touching on some of the realities of the Yamato's story: the brutality of the discipline, the bitterness of the divide between the men who justifiably resented being sent on a useless suicide mission and those willing to fight to maintain the pretense it was anything else, and the unpleasant horror of the battle itself, which moved me deeply in that, whatever bravery was being shown, it had no even symbolic value.The acting is good, the special effects passable (yet strangely effective because they were clearly effects), and the direction decent. In its way I found it far, far moving effective in portraying war than the "we can be heroes" efforts of better Hollywood. No one would willingly support a war such as this.Off topic? To speak up in this, hopefully very atypical, case, the voting on this movie, at this point, is a disgrace, with nearly all 1s and 10s. Why bother to grind the stupid Yamatodashii!/anti-Japan axes in such a pointless, if revealing fashion. 90% of the "reviewers" outta be ashamed of themselves.