Blood on the Sun (1945) [Drama] [War]

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“Blood on the Sun” (1945) is a film starring James Cagney and Sylvia Sidney. The film is based on a fictional history behind the Tanaka Memorial document. The film won the Academy Award for Best Art Direction for a Black & White (Wiard Ihnen, A. Roland Fields) film in 1945.

Nick Condon (James Cagney) is a journalist for the Tokyo Chronicle. He prints a story disclosing Japan’s plan to conquer the world. The newspaper is seized by Japanese officers. Condon gets the Tanaka Plan, a paper in which all the plans are described. The Japanese spies who follow him think that Ollie and Edith Miller (Wallace Ford and Rosemary DeCamp) are the ones who discovered the plan because they suddenly have a lot of money and are coming back to the USA. When Condon goes to the ship to bid them farewell, he finds Edith dead. He can only see a woman’s hand with a ring with a huge ruby. Back home, he finds Ollie, in terrible condition. He gets from Ollie the Tanaka plan.

Premier Giichi Tanaka (John Emery) wants his plans to remain secret, and sends Col. Hideki Tojo (Robert Armstrong) Capt. Oshima (John Halloran) and Hijikata (Leonard Strong) to follow him everywhere. Condon loses the document with the Tanaka plan. Ollie’s disappeared, and the police arrest them in terms of scandal and much noise while having a party with two girls in his apartment, which is a complete lie.

Condon meets Iris Hilliard (Sylvia Sidney), half American and half Chinese. At first, he suspects her of being the lady in the ship, then he doesn’t. They fall in love. She seems to be betraying him, especially when Condon sees the ring with the ruby in her hand.

At the end, it turns out she’s been sent by a politician who wants peace and was present when the Tanaka plan was devised. Condon leaves his job after ten days. When he’s about to leave Japan, he meets the politician and Iris in the harbour. The politician signs the document to prove it’s real. They are discovered by the Japanese army.

Iris runs away with the document in a cargo ship which will take her out of Japan. To distract the Japanese officers, Condon fights his greatest enemy and tries to reach the American Embassy. He’s shot at by spies dressed in street clothes, but he’s not killed. The consular adviser goes out of the Embassy and takes Condon inside still alive, and the Japanese officers can’t prevent it, because they couldn’t find the Tanaka document when registering Condon.

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Directed by Frank Lloyd, produced by William Cagney, written by Garrett Fort and Lester Cole, starring James Cagney, Sylvia Sidney and Porter Hall.

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Source: “Blood on the Sun” Wikipedia, The Free Encyclopedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc.. 27 May 2012. Web. 5 August 2012. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blood_on_the_Sun.

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34 Replies to “Blood on the Sun (1945) [Drama] [War]”

  9. I am not surprised. He spent time on the streets in Hell's Kitchen in NYC. He was a real unique individual. All through his early years on Broadway and early film, he would work at other non-entertainment jobs. For the money, and because he had an incredible work ethic. He was close friends with my favorite actress of all time Joan Blondell. They cam to Hollywood together in 1931.

  18.   According to Wikipedia, an old Russian intelligence officer has said that the Tanaka Memorial was a fake created in 1931 to influence Western powers against Japan.  It first appeared in Communist publications and a Japanese version has never been found. 
      I much enjoyed the movie.  Cagney managed to get through it without slugging any women.  Thanks for posting. 

  19. Credits for "1945" inaccurate; film credits MCMIV indicate 1944--M for 1000, CM 1000-100, and IV 5-1… reading lain numerals a vanishing art … :(

  20. And of course, a Russian Intelligence Officer MUST be telling the truth? I don't think we needed anything to convince us to be against Japan, since they were already in Manchuria??

  22. Upon his death a network assembled a small clip that was a montage of him slugging women in 3 or 4 movies.  He often played a poorly educated criminal of the depression, of which there were plenty,  so he had to get tough with some broads occasionally. 

  28. To clarify the film credit issue on its production year vrs it's release date. The film was in final edit in 1944. But the official US release date was April 1945. Films in the 30s 40s that had end of year production finalization, often did not have release dates until the following year.

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