Chung Mo Excellent direction and acting highlight this WW2 fantasy which build upon a film genre that doesn't get much play outside Japan, the Japanese WW2 drama. Hundreds of war films have been made since the US occupation after the war. Most of the films are about the human tragedy of the war instead of glorifying the effort to create a racist empire. As a side note which relates to this film in an way, Eji Tsuburaya, the special effect mastermind behind the Godzilla films, never thought much about his monster effects. He was always the most proud of his work recreating WW2 battles and we in the US never have seen this work.The plot is well described elsewhere here so I'll skip to other points about the film. The production is very well done and realist-looking most of the time. I am sort of sorry that they introduced a number of fantasy elements to the story that just upset the atmosphere for me. Somehow the Nazis managed to create a holographic radar system and made only one which they gave to the Japanese instead of using for themselves. On top of that the system requires a psychic/empath to be attached to it by tubes. On top of that they somehow have a beautiful Japanese girl who was sent to the concentration camps before she was experimented on and attached to the system. On top of that somehow her operatic singing has the ability to pass thru walls, seawater and broadcast itself over the radio. The idea that the US was preparing to bomb Tokyo with a third atom bomb wasn't much of a problem although the historical record indicates that the two bombs were all the US had at the time.As mentioned here already also, I felt like I was watching an episode of Leiji Matsumoto's Space Pirate Captain Harlock during a rousing speech about free will. Believe me it's much more convincing coming out of the anime character's mouth if you have the luxury of comparison. The CGI effects were mostly video game cut scene quality and the depiction of sea battles were unrealistic. The sub-plot about military commanders taking over is based on actual events at the same time but what happens in the film is a very strange comment on the opinions of actual Japanese war veterans who agree with the US decision to drop the atomic bomb.OK film not for heavy thinking.

edstrelow The movie is set in the waning days of World War II, Japanese cities are being devastated by firebombing, and Hiroshima has been Atom- bombed. The plot centers on an attempt to prevent further Atomic incineration of Japanese cities by using an advanced submarine to prevent the delivery of other bombs. The Japanese cast was very strong and as others have noted, the American characters which are often third-rate actors in Japanese movies, were at least OK. The submarine was supposedly a late donation from the Nazi's to Japan. In fact in the film, it is almost identical to the French Surcouf submarine, which defected to the allies after France fell to the Germans. The Sci-Fi element is a young girl with an almost telepathic ability to see underwater. (I really don't think this information will spoil anything, but some viewers may be excessively touchy on such details) Other plot twists I will leave unsaid. I was fascinated by the way the Japanese attitude to the war was presented. The link with the Nazi's was somewhat explored and there was much discussion of the faults of the elders of Japanese society for starting a war which caused such chaos to the country. Not to be too critical on this point, but the movie did seem to dwell solely on the harm which befell the Japanese people, with no acknowledgment of the harm the Japanese did to others by starting an aggressive war in the first place. The Japanese have been criticized on this issue in other contexts, notably by the Chinese. Not that this detracts from the movie, but is is something we Gaijin (foreigners) may note.Nevertheless there is a sensitivity shown in the telling of the story which is quite remarkable given the subject matter. I found the movie to have a literary and almost poetic feel compared to a comparable American film. I mean have you ever seen a discussion of Dostoyevsky in an American Movie? One understands the suffering of a people, few of whom had any say in starting the disastrous events of the war. The soldiers mostly just "followed orders". The civilians of the cities of Japan, ended up as the real victims.The subplot involving the Captain on shore who orders the submarine on its mission, is not so much hard to follow as to understand the motivation. Possibly it makes more sense to the Japanese audience, who would be familiar with the book on which this is based.The computer work was not up to western standards, but was serviceable. I was left wondering if anyone would be prepared to hire an American or New Zealand lab to redo this to a higher standard. To do so would make the movie a genuine epic.

md722 The film reveals the Japanese's view of themselves as "the victim of Atomic bomb". The crew of the submarine Lorelei believe that they are fighting for their homeland and the future of Japan and hence sacrifice themselves at the end of the movie by surfacing on the water (even though the area is surrounded by US fleets) so that they can take down the US airplane which was carrying the third atom bomb heading for another drop in Japan. Of course the whole situation is fictional but the Japanese should know that they never needed to see Hiroshima or Nagasaki if those stupid Japanese war maniacs and that irresponsible Emperor had surrendered in prior.

Michael Studte Lorelei can best be described as a Japanese version of "Das Boot" with a supernatural storyline thrown in. The setting is the last week of WWII, Hiroshima having just been bombed. A Japanese veteran captain is given command of a German-surplus submarine with a secret weapon, the "Lorelei System". As viewers of Japanese movies will know, scenes with English-speaking characters usually end up very awkward, with the English-speakers often being cheap local "talent" grabbed off the street, in most cases with very questionable English credentials. But this movie was just about on-par with the classic Tora Tora Tora, using professional Hollywood and local English-speaking actors that portray their roles to near perfection, making the whole movie flow smoothly. Without giving away spoilers, it's difficult to review this movie. But the advancement of computer graphics has made for some really visually stunning submarine battle action. If anything, the surface vessels come across as being a bit lifeless, as the effort was spent on the underwater sequences. At 140 minutes the movie is long, and by western standards probably somewhat talky, but there is a lot of political maneuvering going on in this movie, plus the diverting from history as we know it, that requires the additional dialogue. All actors put in very decent performances, the soundtrack is fittingly orchestrated and the cinematography excellent. While not being the classic that "Das Boot" was, this movie is very enjoyable, and with subtitles could potentially get a decent western cult following.