''The Highest Honour'' is a 1982 Australian/Japanese co-production about

Operation Jaywick Operation Jaywick was a special operation undertaken in World War II. In September 1943, 14 commandos and sailors from the Allied Z Special Unit raided Japanese shipping in Singapore Harbour, sinking six ships. Background Special Operations ...

and

Operation Rimau Operation Rimau was an attack on Japanese shipping in Singapore Harbour, carried out by an Allied commando unit Z Special Unit, during World War II using Australian built Hoehn military MKIII folboats. It was a follow-up to the successful ''Ope ...

Z Special Unit Z Special Unit () was a joint Allied special forces unit formed during the Second World War to operate behind Japanese lines in South East Asia. Predominantly Australian, Z Special Unit was a specialist reconnaissance and sabotage unit that i ...

during

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

. The same story inspired the TV mini-series '' Heroes'' (1988) and '' Heroes II: The Return'' (1991).

Plot

During World War II, a team of Australian soldiers from Z Special Unit, including Ivan Lyon and Robert Page, successfully lead an expedition to destroy ships in Singapore harbour, Operation Jaywick. An attempt to duplicate this success, Operation Rimau, ends in disaster, with the team either killed or captured. These soldiers are interrogated by the Japanese in Singapore, with Page forming a friendship with Minoru Tamiya. Eventually all the Australians are convicted of war crimes and executed.

Cast

John Howard John Winston Howard (born 26 July 1939) is an Australian former politician who served as the 25th prime minister of Australia from 1996 to 2007, holding office as leader of the Liberal Party. His eleven-year tenure as prime minister is the ...

as Capt. Robert Page *

Atsuo Nakamura is a Japanese actor and politician. He has appeared in more than 50 films since 1964. His younger brother Katsuyuki Nakamura is a writer. Career Nakamura first joined the Haiyuza theatre troupe in 1962, and became famous for his starring role i ...

as Minoru Tamiya * Stuart Wilson as Lt. Col.

Ivan Lyon Lieutenant Colonel Ivan Lyon, (17 August 1915 – 16 October 1944) was a British soldier and military intelligence agent during the Second World War. As a member of Z Special Unit Lyon took part in a number of commando operations against the J ...

Steve Bisley Steve Bisley (born 26 December 1951) is an Australian writer, film and television actor. He is best known for his roles in the films '' Mad Max'' and ''The Great Gatsby''. On TV, some of his better-known roles include Detective Sergeant Jack C ...

as A.B. W.G. Falls *

Michael Aitkens Michael Aitkens (born 1947) is a British actor and writer of drama scripts for movies, television and stage. His BBC situation comedy '' Waiting for God'', first shown in 1990, was BAFTA nominated. Michael Aitkens was educated at Haileybury i ...

as Major Ingleton * George Mallaby as Lt. Cmdr. Don Davidson *

Tony Bonner Anthony Frederick Bonner (born 23 November 1943) is an Australian television, film and stage actor and singer. Bonner became famous in the 1960s children's television series '' Skippy the Bush Kangaroo'', later moving on to lead roles in the ...

as Lt. W.G. Carey *

John Ley John Ley (4 February 1583 – 16 May 1662) was an English clergyman and member of the Westminster Assembly. Life He was born in Warwick and received his early education at the free school in that town. On 12 February 1602, he entered Christ Chur ...

as Lt. A.I. Sargent * Harold Hopkins as Cpl. C.M. Stewart * Garry Waddell as Cpl. R.B. Fletcher *

Slim DeGrey Clifford Frank de Grey (20 May 1918 – 16 March 2007), better known as Slim De Grey, was an English-Australian actor, compere, musician, lyricist, composer and comedian. He served in the Australian Army during World War II, seeing action in t ...

as Leading Stoker J.P. McDowell *

Alan Cassell Alan Louis Cassell (16 February 1932 – 30 August 2017) was an English Australian actor, on stage, film and television. Personal life Alan Cassell was born in Manchester, England but grew up in Birmingham. Cassell was of a young age when his m ...

as Lt. Ted Carse *

Mark Hembrow Mark Hembrow (born 1955, in Brisbane) is an Australian actor, writer and musician. He has also has worked as a producer and director. Early life and family Hembrow's parents were Vernon Charles Hembrow, a senior English Literature Lecturer at ...

as Able Seaman F.W. Marsh *

Vincent Ball Vincent Martin Ball OAM (born 4 December 1923) is an Australian retired character actor of radio, stage and screen, active in the industry for nearly 55 years (with a brief return) firstly in Britain and then his native Australia. He has also ...

as Lt. Cmdr. Hubert Marsham * Craig Ballard as Lt. B. Raymond * James Belton as Lt. H.R. Ross *Warren Coleman as Leading Seaman K.P. Cain *

Diane Craig Diane Mary Craig (born 1949), sometimes credited as Di Craig, is a Northern Irish-born Australian actress best known for her performances in film and television. She was born in County Down, and since 1971 has been married to award-winning Aust ...

as Mrs. Page *

George Duff Captain George Duff RN (c. 1 February 1764 – 21 October 1805) was a British naval officer during the American War of Independence, the French Revolutionary Wars and the Napoleonic Wars, who was killed by a cannonball at the Battle of Trafalg ...

as Cpl. A.G. Campbell *

Tim Elston Tim Elston is an Australian actor. He was known for his acting roles on television as Detective Mitchell in '' Bellamy'', Doctor Scott Collins in '' Prisoner'' and police sergeant Warren Bryant in '' Richmond Hill''. External links * Austra ...

as Sgt. D.P. Gooley *

Takuya Fujioka was a Japanese actor. He is most famous for playing the role of Daikichi Okakura on the television drama series ''Wataru Seken wa Oni Bakari''. Fujioka attended Kwansei Gakuin University but dropped out because of illness. His first starring ro ...

as Matsumoto *

Ken Goodlet Kenneth Edwin Goodlet (11 October 1921- 15 November 2006) was an Australian actor with extensive credits in film, radio, TV and theatre, known for Ned Kelly (1970), Bluey (1976) and The Long Arm (1970). Select Credits *'' One Morning Near Troo ...

as Bill Reynolds *John Griffiths as Sgt. C.B. Cameron * Riki Harada as Sgt. Imai * Michael Harrs as Lt Cpl. J.T. Hardy *

Noel Hodda Noel Hodda (born 1954) is an Australian actor, writer, dramaturge, director and teacher. Acting career Hodda was a founding member of the Riverina Theatre Company, located in Wagga Wagga and Project TYER, a Theatre In Education Co., for whom h ...

as Able Seaman M.M. Berryman * Andrew Inglis as Able Seaman A.M. Jones *

Kin'ya Kitaōji is a Japanese actor. Biography Early life He was born in Kyoto, son of '' jidaigeki'' film star Ichikawa Utaemon, and graduated from Waseda University School of Letters, Arts and Sciences II in Tokyo. Acting career Kin'ya made his debut with ...

as Tachibana * Hôsei Komatsu as Yabe *

Hitomi Kuroki Hitomi Kuroki (Japanese: ; Katakana: ''Kuroki Hitomi''; born October 5, 1960, in Kurogi-Machi, Yame District, Fukuoka, Japan) is a Japanese actress and film director. Her birth name is Shoko Ichiji ( ''Ichiji Shōko'') née Egami ( ''Egami Shōk ...

as Nurse Keiko Tsumura *

Veronica Lang Veronica Lang is an Australian-born actress, who started her career in England in theatre and television, before working in her native country, she also briefly worked in America. She won the 1977 AFI Award for Best Actress in a Supporting Role ...

as Mrs. Lyon * Hu Yin Mong as Lu Ran Shi * Yû Numazaki as Capt. Nomura * Neil Redfern as WO2 A. Warren * Jiro Sakagami as Kimura *

Taro Shigaki was a Japanese actor and voice actor. Filmography Acting roles * Hidetaro in ''Akantare'' (xxxx) * Lieutenant Commander Sasai in ''Samurai!'' (xxxx) * Minamoto no Yoshitsune in '' Shin Heike Monogatari'' (1972) * Kusaka Genzui in ''Kashin'' ( ...

as Hayakawa * Trevor Sommers as Sub. Lt. J.G. Riggs * Mizuho Suzuki as Maj. Gen. Kawamura * Jonathan Sweey as Cpl. A. Crilley * Hajime Tawara as Sgt. Maj. Omori

Production

Producers

John McCallum John McCallum (born 9 April 1950) is a Canadian politician, economist, diplomat and former university professor. A former Liberal Member of Parliament ( MP), McCallum was the Canadian Ambassador to China from 2017 to 2019. He was asked for h ...

and Lee Robinson had previously made a film about

, ''

Attack Force Z ''Attack Force Z'' (alternatively titled ''The Z Men'') is a 1982 Australian-Taiwanese World War II film directed by Tim Burstall. It is loosely based on actual events and was filmed in Taiwan in 1979. It was screened at the Cannes Film Festiv ...

'' (1981). Robinson said he was approached to make the film by a member of the Australian embassy in Tokyo in 1980. He says the official asked him if he was interested in making a movie about Jaywick and Rimau with a Japanese company. Robinson says he spent a year researching the story in Japanese and Australian archives. The film was originally shot under the title of ''Southern Cross''. Production took place in 1982. It was financed by two dozen Australian businessmen and a Japanese production company, Shinihon Eija, who contributed $1.5 million in marketing and production costs. There were two versions of the film – Australian and Japanese. Robinson later said the two versions were intrinsically the same but the emphasis in the Japanese film was more towards the Japanese actors and vice versa. Robinson later said that "the film is a human story of how a friendship can develop among enemies and how human spirit rises above the atrocities of war. It is an anti-war film set in a period remembered for horrendous slayings of civilians."

Release

The film was never released theatrically in AustraliaDavid Stratton, ''The Avocado Plantation: Boom and Bust in the Australian Film Industry'', Pan MacMillan, 1990 p44 but did screen as a TV mini-series in 1989. It did obtain a theatrical release in the US and UK and McCallum says the film sold widely to television. It was also known as ''Heroes of the Krait'' and '' Minami Jujisei''.''The Highest Honour''
at

National Film and Sound Archive The National Film and Sound Archive of Australia (NFSA), known as ScreenSound Australia from 1999 to 2004, is Australia's audiovisual archive, responsible for developing, preserving, maintaining, promoting and providing access to a national co ...

The widow of Bob Page and survivors of Z Force were furious with the film, claiming it was far too complimentary to the Japanese. Robinson admitted the film was "50 percent fiction" and that "there is no doubt that the whole picture is designed as an apology, but with facts as dramatic as these, why play around with it? What gives the film the impact is the constant reminder that this is true."Sue Johnson, 'After 37 years and 10 beheadings, Operation Rimau Explodes Again', ''The Sydney Morning Herald'', 27 March 1982 p 41 Robinson admitted there was an occasion when the Japanese producers wanted the prison set to have pillows and sheets on the bed to make them look nicer, but he refused. A scene where a Japanese officer comes to Australia ten years after the war to make peace with one of the widows, Roma Greemish, was cut at the request of Ms Greemish. McCallum later said that "Stuart Wilson was very good in" the film but:

It got bogged down with too much Japanese dialogue, because they were co-producing, and put up half the money. They insisted on a lot of Japanese. I said, 'You're the villains in this, you beheaded the Australians.' But they thought they'd make a huge amount of money out of it; the man behind the film company was a millionaire. He took us up there, Robinson and myself and some of the actors, and we had a great jamboree of a week in Tokyo, where he had a huge launch of the damn thing in a huge cinema. He said 'We're releasing it tomorrow all over Japan. We expect to make three million.' I think they lost three million.John McCallum interview with Brian McFarlane, ''The Oxford Companion to Australian Film'', Oxford University Press, 1999 p 300

In 1982

Thomas Keneally Thomas Michael Keneally, AO (born 7 October 1935) is an Australian novelist, playwright, essayist, and actor. He is best known for his non-fiction novel '' Schindler's Ark'', the story of Oskar Schindler's rescue of Jews during the Holocaust, ...

was reported as working on a script for another film based on Operation Rimau called ''Rimau'' for the

South Australian Film Corporation South Australian Film Corporation (SAFC) is a South Australian Government statutory corporation established in 1972 to engage in film production and promote the film industry, located in Adelaide, South Australia. The Adelaide Studios are manage ...

to be made for $1 million, but no film eventuated.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Highest Honour, The 1982 films 1980s English-language films Pacific War films Films set in Singapore Films shot in Singapore Australia–Japan relations 1980s war films Australian World War II films Japanese World War II films Films directed by Peter Maxwell 1980s Japanese films