(Cecil B. de Mille's Classic World War I Spy Drama Starrin...)
Cecil B. de Mille's Classic World War I Spy Drama Starring Sessue Hayakawa In All Regions DVD Format! Japan was an ally of Britain and America during World War I, unlike World War II. Accordingly, the great Cecil B. de Mille directs this picture where we see manifold Japanese stereotypes of the day peculiarly employed in the service of good as Sessue Hayakawa portrays a Japanese spy trying to protect American military secrets from the Germans (1917, 1 Hour 8 Minutes, Black and White, Silent) ||||| Like all our titles, this disc is beautifully inkjet printed on the archival quality disc stock, on the front j-card's cover graphics and on the back j-card text description, and is shipped in durable shatterproof jewel case stock. ||||| Thanks for shopping with us, we appreciate it! EarthStation1: The Sights And Sounds Of The Known And Unknown Universe TM, the world wide web's first, most renowned and most awarded historical multimedia archives since its establishment in March 1996, has been approved for teaching history and media studies by many diverse educational institutions and governments worldwide. *Check Out Our Contributions On PBS TV Throughout Ken Burns' Landmark World War II Documentary Series THE WAR As Well As On HISTORY DETECTIVES and The History Channel's WORLD WAR II IN HD - And Check Out Our Contributions To The Current 2013-2014 Season Of UNSEALED ALIEN FILES/UNSEALED CONSPIRACY FILES!* Be sure to check out our other items for sale for more great vintage and historical media titles!
https://www.amazon.com/Secret-Game-DVD-Sessue-Hayakawa/dp/B00MKYHI90?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B00MKYHI90
(THE CHEAT (1915) THE CAMPUS CARMEN (1928) THE CHEAT star...)
THE CHEAT (1915) THE CAMPUS CARMEN (1928) THE CHEAT starring Fannie Ward, Sessue Hayakawa and Jack Dean. Directed by Cecil B. Demille. In a fit of greed, Mrs. Hardy steals $10,000.00 intended for the Red Cross and invests it in stock. She hopes to make a quick profit to buy herself some new gowns. When the stock fails, she is forced to replace the money with a loan from the evil, lecherous Hara Arakua, a wealthy ivory merchant. The debt is to be repaid not with money, but with Mrs. Hardy's virtue. When Arakua is found shot, the innocent Mr. Hardy is jailed for the crime. A landmark in silent film, THE CHEAT was definitely intended for an adult audience. It includes the famous scene in which the villain marks his victim with a hot branding iron! THE CAMPUS CARMEN starring Carole Lombard and Daphne Pollard . Directed by Alf Goulding. A Mack Sennett production. Featuring an early screen appearance by the wonderful Carole Lombard, this short comedy gem takes us to the campus of Sunnydale Girl's School where the girls, after a disastrous dorm room pillow fight, are forbidden to stage "Carmen" at the school. Rather than give in to defeat, they decide to put on the show in a rented theater. Needless to say, the performance does not go as planned. Original piano scores composed and performed by Stuart Oderman. When sold by Amazon.com, this product is manufactured on demand using DVD-R recordable media. Amazon.com's standard return policy will apply.
https://www.amazon.com/CHEAT-CAMPUS-CARMEN-Carole-Lombard/dp/B01LTHX5HC?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B01LTHX5HC
https://www.amazon.com/Tokyo-Joe-Humphrey-Bogart/dp/B002HGVU3Q?SubscriptionId=AKIAJRRWTH346WSPOAFQ&tag=prabook-20&linkCode=sp1&camp=2025&creative=165953&creativeASIN=B002HGVU3Q
Sessue Hayakawa was born Kintaro Hayakawa on June 10, 1889 in Minamiboso, Chiba province, Japan. He was the son of Yoichiro and Kane Hayakawa. His father, the governor of Chiba province, took great pride in his aristocratic lineage and raised all his sons according to samurai ideals.
Despite the family's well-to-do life-style, Yoichiro had his son complete such menial tasks as cleaning lamps so the child would not "grow up a soft man of a rich family. "
"Kimbo, " as Hayakawa was called as a child, was educated at the Navy Preparatory School in Tokyo, graduating in 1908. He then entered the Naval Academy in Etajima but a ruptured eardrum resulted in his dismissal. Hayakawa was very disappointed by this; in fact, he wanted to commit suicide. He attempted hara-kiri, stabbing himself thirty times, but was saved in the last seconds, thanks to his father’s quick actions. His condition was critical for weeks.
In May 1909 he rescued a group of Americans whose ship had crashed in Tokyo Bay. Speaking with the Americans sparked his interest in traveling to the United States. Overcoming his father's opposition, Hayakawa enrolled in the University of Chicago to study political science. A star football player, he was thrown off the team for using judo to overcome his opponents. He graduated in 1913.
On his way home to Japan, Hayakawa stopped in Los Angeles to see a performance of the Japanese Theatre. Claiming he could do a better job, Hayakawa changed his first name to Sessue and embarked on an acting career. He made his Hollywood debut in 1914 when his staging of Typhoon caught the attention of producer Thomas Ince, who then filmed the play with Hayakawa as the lead.
Hayakawa's career was firmly established in 1916 when he starred in The Cheat. It was years before he could share his success with his family, however, for they regarded acting as a drop in status. All told, Hayakawa appeared in more than 120 silent films, including The Bottle Imp, The City of Dim Faces, and Hidden Pearls.
In 1918 Hayakawa began his own film company, Haworth Pictures Corporation, bankrolled by a million-dollar loan from the parents of a college friend. Two years later, Hayakawa had made more than $2 million and repaid the loan.
His fame was so great that in 1921 he was invited to visit President Warren Harding. On his salary of $7, 500 per week, Hayakawa and his family lived in grand style in a thirty-two-room mansion on Argyle Avenue in Hollywood. Their lavish parties became the stuff of legend and earned their home the nickname "Argyle Castle. " The family left Hollywood in 1922 after an attempt was made on Hayakawa's life.
Hayakawa then traveled throughout America and Europe, starring in various plays. In 1923 he played to a packed house in France; a few months later, he gave a command performance for King George V and Queen Mary of England. A high-roller, he calmly lost a considerable sum gambling one night in 1926. His goldplated Pierce Arrow automobile was so large that he ended up donating it to a fire department. Three years later, he returned to America to star in The Love City on Broadway. The following year he established a Zen study hall in New York. In 1931, Paramount released Hayakawa's first talking picture, Daughter of the Dragon, while he continued to appear in plays throughout the Far East and in Paris. Hayakawa's travel was cut short by World War II, when his sympathy with the West precluded his return to Japan. He moved to Paris and for twelve years supported his family by painting on silk.
When the war ended, Hayakawa resumed his acting career, accepting Humphrey Bogart's invitation to appear in Tokyo Joe (1949). That same year, he returned to Japan and produced the play The Life of the Buddha. In 1956 Hayakawa was offered the role of Colonel Saito in the film version of The Bridge on the River Kwai.
At his wife's urging he accepted the part. "From the conflict of two men--Nicholson, the English colonel, and Saito, the Japanese colonel--stems all the futility of war, " Hayakawa later wrote.
After this dramatic comeback, Hayakawa enjoyed a brief resurgence of his earlier fame. When it faded at the end of the 1950s, he moved to a small bungalow in Tokyo and taught acting. In addition to his skills as an actor and director and his religious devotion, Hayakawa spoke Japanese, English, French, Spanish, German, Chinese, East Indian, and Malay.
Hayakawa died in 1973 in Japan.
Sessue Hayakawa went down in history as one of the first and biggest Hollywood stars and sex symbols of all time, and the first actor of Asian descent to achieve stardom as a leading man in the United States and Europe. Hayakawa was one of the highest paid stars of his time, earning $5, 000 per week in 1915, and $2 million per year through his own production company from 1918 to 1921. Of his talkies, Hayakawa is probably best known for his role as Colonel Saito in The Bridge on the River Kwai (1957), for which he earned a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor; he was also nominated for a Golden Globe for the role. Hayakawa starred in over 80 feature films, and two of his films, "The Cheat" and "The Bridge on the River Kwai" stand in the United States National Film Registry.
(THE CHEAT (1915) THE CAMPUS CARMEN (1928) THE CHEAT star...)
(Cecil B. de Mille's Classic World War I Spy Drama Starrin...)
book
After retiring, Hayakawa dedicated himself to Zen Buddhism. To honor his work, Hayakawa was selected for the Zen Buddhist priesthood, passed his examination, and was ordained. He believed the concentration and discipline of Zen greatly improved his acting as well as the quality of his life. In his 1960 autobiography Zen Showed Me the Way, Hayakawa wrote, "Through Zen I am able to empty my mind of all thoughts that may hinder my performance. "
Quotations:
"Public acceptance of me in romantic roles was a blow of sorts against racial intolerance, even though I lost the girl in the last reel. "
"Destiny has brought me much; she has been kind. But it has been left to me to fashion the acumen of deeds in the pattern destiny has drawn, to solve the great koan of life for myself. "
Hayakawa's "broodingly handsome" good looks and typecasting as a sexually dominant villain made him a heartthrob among American women during a time of racial discrimination, and he became one of the first male sex symbols of Hollywood.
A 1917 profile on Hayakawa stated that he "is proficient in jiu-jitsu, an expert fencer, and can swim like a fish. He is a good horseman and plays a fast tennis racket. He is tall for a Japanese, being five feet seven and a half inches in height, and weighs 157 pounds. "
Hayakawa was also known for his discipline and martial arts skills. While filming The Jaguar's Claws, in the Mojave Desert, Hayakawa played a Mexican bandit, with 500 cowboys as extras. On the first night of filming, the extras drank all night and well into the next day. No work was being done, so Hayakawa challenged the group to a fight. Two men stepped forward. Hayakawa said of the incident, "The first one struck out at me. I seized his arm and sent him flying on his face along the rough ground. The second attempted to grapple and I was forced to flip him over my head and let him fall on his neck. The fall knocked him unconscious. " Hayakawa then disarmed yet another cowboy. The extras returned to work, amused by the way the small man manhandled the big bruising cowboys.
Quotes from others about the person
"What is even more remarkable about Hayakawa's precedent-setting career in Hollywood as an Asian American is the fact that he is virtually ignored in film history as well as star studies. . .. Furthermore, the fact that he reached such a rare level of success whereby he could form and run his own production company makes his omission from the narrative of Hollywood history even more egregious. " - Karla Rae Fuller
On May 1, 1914, Hayakawa married fellow Issei and performer Tsuru Aoki, who co-starred in several of his films. Hayakawa's first child, a son, was born in New York in 1929, to a white actress named Ruth Noble. The boy was known as Alexander Hayes, but the name was changed to Yukio after Sessue and Aoki adopted the child and took him to be raised and educated in Japan. Later, Hayakawa had two daughters with Aoki: Yoshiko, an actress, and Fujiko, a dancer. Aoki died in 1961.
