''Visas and Virtue'' is a 1997 narrative short film directed by

Chris Tashima Christopher Inadomi Tashima (born March 24, 1960) is a Japanese American actor and director. He is co-founder of the entertainment company Cedar Grove Productions and Artistic Director of its Asian American theatre company, Cedar Grove OnStage. T ...

and starring Chris Tashima, Susan Fukuda, Diana Georger and Lawrence Craig. It was inspired by the true story of

Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...

rescuer Chiune "Sempo" Sugihara, who is known as "The

Japanese Japanese may refer to: * Something from or related to Japan, an island country in East Asia * Japanese language, spoken mainly in Japan * Japanese people, the ethnic group that identifies with Japan through ancestry or culture ** Japanese diaspor ...

Schindler". Sugihara issued over 2,000

transit visa A visa (from the Latin ''charta visa'', meaning "paper that has been seen") is a conditional authorization granted by a polity to a foreigner that allows them to enter, remain within, or leave its territory. Visas typically include limits on t ...

s to

Polish Polish may refer to: * Anything from or related to Poland, a country in Europe * Polish language * Poles Poles,, ; singular masculine: ''Polak'', singular feminine: ''Polka'' or Polish people, are a West Slavic nation and ethnic group, w ...

and

Lithuanian Jews Lithuanian Jews or Litvaks () are Jews with roots in the territory of the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania (covering present-day Lithuania, Belarus, Latvia, the northeastern Suwałki and Białystok regions of Poland, as well as adjacent areas ...

from his consulate in Kaunas,

Lithuania Lithuania (; lt, Lietuva ), officially the Republic of Lithuania ( lt, Lietuvos Respublika, links=no ), is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea. Lithuania ...

, in August 1940, in defiance of his own government (Japan), thereby allowing an estimated 6,000 individuals to escape the impending

Background

This film is a dramatization (

docu-drama Docudrama (or documentary drama) is a genre of television and film, which features dramatized re-enactments of actual events. It is described as a hybrid of documentary and drama and "a fact-based representation of real event". Docudramas typi ...

) and contains fictional characters and events. It is not a documentary. It is based on an original

one-act play A one-act play is a play that has only one act, as distinct from plays that occur over several acts. One-act plays may consist of one or more scenes. The 20-40 minute play has emerged as a popular subgenre of the one-act play, especially in wri ...

by Tim Toyama, which was performed at The Road Theatre Company in Los Angeles in 1995. The play was then adapted by actor/director

in 1996, and completed as a 26-minute film in 1997. The film was produced by

Cedar Grove Productions Cedar Grove Productions is an independent production company based in Los Angeles, California, specializing in media and theatre arts representing the Asian Pacific American community. Media projects are educational, with Visual Communications ...

with

Visual Communications Visual Communications (also known as VC) –– is a community-based non-profit media arts organization based in Los Angeles. It was founded in 1970 by independent filmmakers Robert Nakamura, Alan Ohashi, Eddie Wong, and Duane Kubo, who were st ...

serving as non-profit sponsor. ''Visas and Virtue'' won the

Oscar Oscar, OSCAR, or The Oscar may refer to: People * Oscar (given name), an Irish- and English-language name also used in other languages; the article includes the names Oskar, Oskari, Oszkár, Óscar, and other forms. * Oscar (Irish mythology) ...

for

Best Live Action Short Film The Academy Award for Best Live Action Short Film is an award presented at the annual Academy Awards ceremony. The award has existed, under various names, since 1957. From 1936 until 1956 there were two separate awards, "Best Short Subject, One- ...

in March, 1998 (

70th Academy Awards The 70th Academy Awards ceremony, organized by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences (AMPAS), took place on March 23, 1998, at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles beginning at 6:00 p.m. PST / 9:00 p.m. EST. During the sh ...

). The

statuettes went to actor and director Tashima and producer

Chris Donahue Chris Donahue (born John Christopher Donahue) is an American film and television producer. He began his career as a producer in television news and documentaries, then transitioned to narrative film and television at the American Film Institute ...

.70th Oscars winners
on

IndieWire IndieWire (sometimes stylized as indieWIRE or Indiewire) is a film industry and review website that was established in 1996. The site's focus was predominantly independent film, although its coverage has grown to "to include all aspects of Hollyw ...

Synopsis

Haunted by the sight of hundreds of Jewish refugees outside the consulate gates, a Japanese diplomat and his wife, stationed in Kaunas, Lithuania, at the beginning of World War II, must decide how much they are willing to risk. Inspired by a true story, ''Visas and Virtue'' explores the moral and professional dilemmas that Consul General Chiune "Sempo" Sugihara faces in making a life or death decision: defy his own government's direct orders and risk his career, by issuing life-saving transit visas, or obey orders and turn his back on humanity.

Cast

* Chris Tashima as Chiune "Sempo" Sugihara * Susan Fukuda as Yukiko Sugihara * Diana Georger as Helena Rosen * Lawrence Craig as Nathan Rosen *

Shizuko Hoshi Shizuko Hoshi is a Japanese-American actress, theater director, dancer and choreographer. Born in Japan, she is a graduate of Tokyo Women's College and University of Southern California. She was married to actor Mako, the founding artistic direc ...

as Narrator (In order of appearance)
''Japan, 1985'' * Mitsushi Yamaguchi as Elderly Sempo * Kyoko Motoyama as Elderly Yuki ''Lithuania, 1940 * Colm Wood as Student #1 * Eric Gugisch as German Officer * Alan H. Friedenthal as Refugee #1 * Patricia Penn as Refugee #2 * Richard Nakaoka, Weston Yanagihara as Sugihara Children * Linda Igarashi as Setsuko * Jimmy Paola as Student #2 * Kimberly Mungovan as Sugihara Baby ''Refugees at Interviews'' * Martin Fontana as Man * Noel Miller as Young Man * David Russ as Elderly Man * Maria Stanton as Wife * Jude Gerard Prest as Husband * Shauna Bloom as Woman * Gibson Frazier as Cantor * Jon Cellini, Jonathan Klein as Brothers * Pamela Tretter as Mother * Jack Newalu as Man at Train Station ''Special Appearance'' * Hanni Vogelweid as Elderly Woman at Interview

Awards

(partial list) * Academy Award for Live Action Short Film –

*1st Place: Fiction Prize – USA Film Festival/Dallas *"Francisco Garcia de Paso" Award – Huesca International Short Film Contest *Crystal Heart Award –

Heartland Film Festival The Heartland International Film Festival is a film festival held each October in Indianapolis, Indiana. The festival was first held in 1992, its goal is to "inspire filmmaker Filmmaking (film production) is the process by which a motion pictu ...

CINE Ciné film or cine film is the term commonly used in the UK and historically in the US to refer to the 8 mm, Super 8, 9.5 mm, and 16 mm motion picture film formats used for home movies. It is not normally used to refer ...

Golden Eagle1997 CINE winner list
/ref> *Special Jury Prize – Competition for Films and Videos on Japan *"Adriano Morais" Award – Algarve International Film Festival *Golden Shoestring Award –

Rochester International Film Festival Rochester () is a city in the U.S. state of New York, the seat of Monroe County, and the fourth-most populous in the state after New York City, Buffalo, and Yonkers, with a population of 211,328 at the 2020 United States census. Located in Wes ...

*Best Short Film –

Sonoma Valley Film Festival Sonoma International Film Festival (SIFF) is a 501 (c)(3) non-profit arts organization dedicated to promoting the best in independent film and filmmakers from around the world, inspiring savvy film lovers and introducing the power of film to stude ...

References

External links

''Visas and Virtue''
now available o
Vimeo
* {{AcademyAwardBestShort 1981-2000 1997 films 1990s biographical films 1997 short films Films about Japanese Americans American biographical films American films based on plays Films set in the 1940s Holocaust films Jewish Japanese history Jewish Lithuanian history Live Action Short Film Academy Award winners American World War II films Sugihara's Jews 1990s English-language films 1990s American films Films about diplomats