American Pastime
February 19, 2007
EMBARGOED UNTIL MONDAY, FEBRUARY 19
American Pastime
Love of Country, Family, Jazz and the Great Game of Baseball Creates Japanese American Heroes Against All Odds in
Inspiring Film Set in U.S. Internment Camps
Premiering May 22 on WarnerHome Video DVD,Movie
stars Gary Cole, Leonardo Nam and Aaron Yoo
and is produced by High School Musical’sBarryRosenbush
American Pastime
February 19, 2007
Burbank, Calif., February 19, 2007–American Pastime-- a powerful, inspiring drama revealing a rarely considered side of the World War II Japanese American experience --will be seen for the first time when Warner Home Video presents it on DVD May 22.From filmmaker Desmond Nakano (Boulevard Nights, Last Exit to Brooklyn) and set against the background of the 1940’s U.S. internment camps, the film weaves a rich story of a Japanese-American father and his two sons, whose love of family, country, music andthe game of baseball help them find the strength to survive indignity and injustice. The DVD, which will include a making-of featurette and theatrical trailer, will sell for $19.98 SRP.Orders are due April 17.
American Pastime takes viewers into the lives of the Japanese American community at a time when their very foundations were shaken to the core. Adding elements of humor, romance and action, the filmis based on the true events of World War II’s U.S. home front, where nearly a quarter of a million Japanese Americans, though citizens of this country, were uprooted from their homes and placed in remote internment camps because of a perceived security threat. The film’s story centers around one family in Utah’s Topaz camp where the interned community ironically uses baseball, for decades a part of the Japanese American fabric, as a way to rise above their daily hardships and adversity.
Gary Cole (HBO’s upcoming “12 Miles of Bad Road,” Talladega Nights, Office Space) stars in American Pastime, which also features Leonardo Nam (The Fast & Furious: Tokyo Drift, Vantage Point), Aaron Yoo (Disturbia, TV’s “Bedford Diaries”), Masatoshi Nakamura (famed Japanese actor and singer), Judy Ongg Okina (renowned international performer) and Sarah Drew (TV’s “Everwood,” Radio) and Jon Gries (Napoleon Dynamite).
Synopsis
Kaz Nomura (Masatoshi Nakamura) and his wife Emi (Judy Ongg) stoically struggle to maintain a normal life after being forcibly relocated to an internment camp in the remote town of Abraham, Utah.Although allowed to run errands in the town – under supervision – the camp residents are imprisoned behind wire fences and overseen by armed guards.
The Nomura sons Lane (Leonardo Nam) and Lyle (Aaron Yoo) are totally Americanizedand they rebel loudly against their unfair captivity. The older brother Lane, determined to prove his loyalty, enlists in the U.S. Army’s celebrated 442nd Regimental Combat Team (the unit’s slogan is “Go For Broke,”symbolizing the men’s at-all-cost fight for freedom). His brother Lyle is a musician and a baseball superstar who’s embittered when his chance to attend college on a full baseball scholarship is cut short by the War. Lylesoon meets Katie Burrell (Sarah Drew), daughter of camp guard Billy Burrell (Gary Cole), and the two teenagers begin a romance. Katie’s brother is overseas fighting in the Pacific, which brings Lyle and Katie's relationship onto a collision course with her dad’s worst wartime fears.When the romance between Katie and Lyle is discovered, the Burrells and the Nomuras find themselves at odds with each other, even though they’re on the same side of the war.
Billy Burrell, a man whose dream is one more shot at the big leagues,is a star of the minor league baseball club, the Abraham Bees. If not for the war, baseball is a passion he could have shared with Kaz and his sons, who also play for the love of the game.
To show the town of Abraham their fighting spirit, the camp residents propose a baseball game between Billy's team and the Topaz camp's squad and both sides square off in a contest. An unusual wager is proposed, the stakes of which are a large sum of money for the locals; dignity and honor for the Japanese Americans. Lane, having made a devastating wartime sacrifice, comes back from the front to cheer the players to “Go For Broke.” Alongside him, the internment camp families unite behind their team, determined to show that they, too, are patriotic Americans. And through the all-American pastime of baseball, the town of Abraham and the Topaz detainees discover that they’re really not that different after all – they’re both Americans who share the same values, even when a war almost tears them apart.
Historical Background
The internment of Japanese Americans during World War II was one of the worst violations of civil rights in the history of the United States. After Pearl Harbor, more Japanese attacks on the U.S were feared. Bowing to community pressures (primarily from the West Coast), President Roosevelt, on this day exactly 65 years ago, signed Executive Order 9066, which resulted in the forcible internment of 120,000 peopleof Japanese ancestry. The government and the Army, using the term "military necessity," locked up men, women and children in 10 remote camps in isolated desert areas of Arizona, California, Utah, Idaho, Colorado,Wyoming and Arkansas.By the end of the war, however, after being incarcerated for up to four years– surrounded by barbed wire and armed guards - not one of these U.S. citizens was ever convicted or charged with any crime.
Despite internment, Japanese Americans also fought and died in the war. Initially classified as 4-C (“enemy aliens ineligible for the military), Japanese Americans proved to be so skillful they were eventually allowed to serve in the U.S. Army. The 442nd Regimental Combat Team of the United States Army was their unit, and they fought in North Africa, Italy, southern France, and Germany. The “Go For Broke” unit became one of the most highly decorated in U.S. Military history.In a strange twist of fate, 5,000 survivors of the Jewish concentration camp Dachau were liberated by members of the 442nd on April 29, 1945.
Executive Order 9066 was rescinded by President Roosevelt in 1944, and the last of the camps was closed in March, 1946.In 1988, President Reagan signed legislation apologizing for the internment on behalf of the U.S. government and reparations were paid to surviving internees.In recent years, the Congress has adopted legislation authorizing up to $38 million in federal funds to preserve and restore the 10 internment camps and 17 assembly centers as historical landmarks.
Credits
American Pastime screenplay is by Desmond Nakano & Tony Kayden. Barry Rosenbush, who executive produced the 6-time Emmy-nominated hit “High School Musical,” produced along with Tom Gorai and Terry Spazek. David Skinner and Arata Matsushima are executive producers and Kerry Yo Nakagawa, associate producer. Director of photography is Matthew Williams; Mark Yoshikawa is the editor.Production Designer is Christopher Demuri. Casting by Vickie Thomas - Los Angeles. Composer is Joseph Conlan, with baritone saxophone solos by Verdi (Woody) Woodward contributing to the score. American Pastimeis aWarner Home Video presentation of a T & C Pictures, ShadowCatcher Entertainment,Rosy Bushes production of a Desmond Nakano film.
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AMERICAN PASTIME
Street Date: May 22, 2007
Order Due Date: April 17, 2007
Catalog #: 115632
$19.98 SRP
Not Yet Rated
Run Time: 105 minutes
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About Japanese and Japanese American Baseball
an Integral Part of the Japanese American Experience
Baseball in Japan and Japanese American Baseball have existed for more than 100 years.
Baseball was introduced to Japan in 1872 by an American schoolteacher working there at the time Japan was forging ties with America and other countries, after three centuries of feudal isolationism. As one Japanese writer put it, “Baseball is perfect for us. If the Americans hadn’t invented it, we would have.”
Young Japanese boys embraced the new game and by 1905 college baseball was Japan’s number one sport. Professional teams were instituted in 1935 and now every year some 25 million fans faithfully visit the ballparks. It was, in fact, Japan that won last year’s first inaugural World Baseball Classic.
Japanese baseball came to this country during the last decades of the 19th Century. The first Japanese immigrants (called Issei) brought with them a passion for the game and knowledge that made them stand out among other immigrants. The Issei built their own ballparks and formed their own teams as early at 1903. Seattle, Los Angeles and Honolulu all had teams by 1905 and organized leagues by 1910.
With the birth here of second-generation Japanese American children (Nisei), baseball grew even more popular, reflecting renewed optimism at finding a place in America. The Nisei eventually joined Japanese American baseball teams and semi-pro leagues, and from Mexico to Canada, from Hawaii to Nebraska, grandstands overflowed with fans. All-star teams played in Japan, Korea and Manchuria and competed in exhibition games with minor league clubs and all-stars from the Negro and Major Leagues. They shared fields with legends Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Joe DiMaggio, Jackie Robinson, Satchel Paige and many other stars. Nisei baseball was at its height and the 1920s and 1930s were dubbed its Golden Age.
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Following Pearl Harbor, baseball went behind barbed wire after President Roosevelt’s February, 1942 Executive Order resulted in the forcible internment of 120,000 people of Japanese ancestry. Baseball played a major role in creating a sense of normalcy for the internees. All 10 internment camps established teams; one camp had a year-round baseball league with 32 teams and championship games that drew crowds of thousands.
After the war, Japanese Americans started leagues again, but the landscape was now severely altered. The first generation Issei, baseball’s most passionate fans, had passed away; many of the of top players had opportunities to play at higher levels in college and even professionally in Japan; and opportunities in mainstream culture for the younger third-generation Japanese Americans (Sansei) eroded the social need for these leagues.
The first Japanese national to play in the major leagues was Masanori Murakami who was signed by the San Francisco Giants in 1963. A Japanese American finally made it to the major leagues in 1975, when Hawaiian born Ryan Kurosaki made his pitching debut as a St. Louis Cardinal. Ryan’s teammate in Hawaii was Lenn Sakata who, two years later, would become the first Japanese American position player with the Milwaukee Brewers. Eighteen years after that, pitcher Hideo Nomo joined the Los Angeles Dodgers, became Rookie of the Year and changed the way Americans saw Japanese, Japanese American and other Asian players. (Japanese American Wally Yonamine, hired by the San Francisco 49ers in 1947, was the first NFL player of Japanese ancestry. He went on to become the first American to play professional baseball in Japan and the only American ever inducted into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame.)
Players from Japan on Major League Baseball teams this season are All Star Ichiro Suzuki, Kenji Jojima (Seattle Mariners); All star Hideki Matsui, Kei Igawa (New York Yankees); Takashi Saito (L.A. Dodgers); Daisuke Matsuzaka, Hideki Okajima (Boston Red Sox); Kaz Matsui (Colorado Rockies); Tadahito Iguchi (Chicago White Sox) and So Taguchi (St Louis Cardinals).
Based on the writings of Kerry Yo Nakagawa, Associate Producer of The American Pastime” and author of “Through a Diamond: 100 Years of Japanese American Baseball”; and on “A Century of Japanese American Baseball” by Gary T. Otake
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