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Fall Seven Times, Get Up Eight: The Japanese War Brides (2015)

The directors of this documentary short—Lucy Craft, Karen Kasmauski and Kathryn Tolbert—are journalists whose fathers were U.S. service members stationed in post-World War II Japan and whose mothers were among the tens of thousands of so-called “Japanese war brides.”

The three Japanese women profiled here—Hiroko Furukawa, Emiko Fukumoto and Atsuko Onda—frankly acknowledge to their daughters that they did not marry strictly for romantic reasons, but because they were eager to leave the economic chaos of Japan in favor of the chance of a better life across the Pacific. However, their only knowledge of the American way of life came from movies and the mostly positive impressions of the Americans involved in the occupation period.

Although the U.S. military was initially opposed to these marriages—in many states, interracial marriage was illegal—it quickly realized that it was unable to prevent fraternizing between U.S. military men and Japanese women. The military switched gears and worked to educate the Japanese women on what they should expect in their American lives—albeit with lessons on baking cakes and wearing make-up.

But once they arrived in the U.S., the challenges faced by the women in their new country were significant. Their spouses’ families were not entirely pleased with their presence, while the wider society was not eager to embrace the mixed raced marriages. The women also faced numerous problems in assimilating into the behavioral patterns of their adopted homes, especially when it came to raising children—strict Japanese parental expectations were dramatically out of step with the more leisurely American approach to raising children, which created additional stress in their households.

At 26 minutes, the film barely scratches the surface on the lives of the directors’ mothers or the wider social upheaval created by the war brides. (The thoughts of the men that married them are not recorded in this film.) But, nonetheless, it offers an intriguing glimpse into a long-forgotten chapter of post-World War II history.

Five More Movie Characters I Want to Marry

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If you’re a pop culture fanatic, you’ve come across one or two fictional characters in your lifetime that you become smitten with and sometimes fall for. It’s entirely possible and happens more frequently than most people realize. I had such a good time compiling my last list of Ten Movie Characters I Want to Marry, that I thought for the upcoming arrival of Valentine’s Day, I’d celebrate by listing Five More Movie Characters I’d Love to Marry.

Who are some movie characters you’d marry if given the opportunity? Let us know in the comments. And Happy Valentine’s, you filthy animal.

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Ten Movie Characters We Want to Marry

Every movie geek, be they a man or woman, gay or lesbian, child or adult, have their own list or choices of movie characters they’ve laid eyes upon that they would love to marry, or have a relationship with. Often times these characters are simply fictional, but it’s possible there are people like them out there, somewhere. If we look hard enough. In either case, like every movie geek we have our list of ten movie characters we’d love to marry, and in the occasion of Valentine’s Day, we explore ten characters from the movies we’d propose to, and love every second with.

Do you have ten movie character you’d marry in a heartbeat? Let us know!
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Ten Underrated Horror Heroines

Yes, we spent all October objectifying women in many articles concerning women in horror and what we’d do during sexual encounters and the final girls we love to ogle while cheering for. Now in the final Friday of October, we spotlight the strong women. They’re bold, courageous, pushed in to a corner, and battle their way out. They have brains, brawn, instinct, and often times are smarter than they men they’re battling alongside. They display amazing resilience in horrible situations, endure dark corners, sub zero temperatures, and maintain their sanity. They meet a challenge head on and fight to the death. These are ten underrated horror heroines we adore, these are ten underrated horror heroines we’d love to have beside us during confrontations with demons, zombies, vampires, or ghosts.

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Ten Horror Femmes We'd Spend the Night With

I remember watching a horror documentary about Dracula, and I forget who exactly said it, but during a screening of Frank Langella’s “Dracula,” two women in the audience admitted that they would completely allow Langella’s Dracula to take them with him and turn them, if they could just spend the night with him. In spite of the inherent attraction and allure of the vampires, men also have those female figures in horror that we wouldn’t mind spending the night with, even if it meant sacrificing our very lives, skin, blood, or brains. For the very reason those women would have given themselves to Dracula is the reason why many men would submit themselves to certain horror femmes. In spite of suffering a slow and possibly painful death, you’re almost guaranteed a night of head exploding, heart rupturing, love making that will leaving you a withered, soulless, but wide grinning corpse. To add to the endless hordes of horror geeks who’d offer themselves up to hot horror figures of the opposite sex, we list ten horror femmes we’d risk our very essence to spend one long night with.

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