People are voting emotionally.

A great movie, one of the best of this year. There was a bit of confusion at one point in the plot, but nothing serious.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

Destination Tokyo was filmed 72 years ago ... and it shows! The tank shots ... with their giant aquatic plants ... are comical! More so the happy banter is so extensive that it ruins the film ... which is way too long (2:15). How much time is dedicated to Wolf and his female exploits? I do understand it was released in 1943 and in turn was designed to make Americans feel good about the war ... but propaganda does not age well ... and these sailors seem very simple and innocent nowadays.But the biggest turnoff is the fact that this film plays way to lose with history and that is offensive! I can take small transgressions (there was no sub involved in the Doolittle raid ... and no men where put ashore for reconnaissance ... and I can live with that ... but to suggest that this sub took out a Japanese Carrier ... in Tokoyo Bay ... during the raid is really offensive! It is also disrespectful to the participants of the real Doolittle raid.On the bright side I did enjoy Cary Grant. I always do!!!!

This engrossing film takes place on a submarine bound for Japan to do a lot of damage. It primarily deals with the personnel on board. Led by Cary Grant, a tough, but real family man, this film goes on to explain various situations, including an emergency appendectomy done by a pharmacist on board the ship.John Garfield, as Wolfie, steals the show. He always talks of his adventures with women. In one scene, he talks about this with the music of Cole Porter's "Night and Day" as a backdrop. Ironically, Cary Grant is not in the scene. Two years later Cary was in a major biographical-picture with that title about the great Porter.Garfield and his guys do their work on land quickly to deliver valuable information that will aid in the bombing. That bombing as well as the bombing that the sub is subjected to is very realistically done.Grant talks of something that we can relate to today. He speaks of young Japanese children being taught at a young age to hate. It's so many years later and we hear the same thing about young Palestinians. War comes from hatred.

First, to all who feel the film was wrong to be used as a propaganda tool portraying the Japanese as villains, terrorists or worse, while the USA was (is) without sin, please use ALL of history as a benchmark. At the time the film was made the Japanese military had committed far more atrocities than the sneak attack on Pearl Harbor. They had invaded China unprovoked, indiscriminately bombed population centers of major Chinese cities and raped, tortured and killed a large population of Nanking, the Chinese capital city. This compares with the German march through Eastern Europe at the same time, combined with the Holocaust as well as the unprovoked Italian conquest of Abysinnia (Ethiopia) in the 1930's. When Jimmy Doolittle's bomb group left the Hornet, they didn't fly in formation, nor arrive over Tokyo in formation. They were forced to leave the Hornet approximately 200 miles sooner than originally planned, due to being detected by a Japanese picket patrol, which the task force sunk. Once Doolittle's plane was airborne it headed for Japan with the remainder of the group following behind at approximately 1 to 2 minute intervals. The film shows the entire bomb group in formation after leaving the Hornet and arriving the same way over Tokyo. In spite of this, and being a bit corny by today's standards, a wonderful tribute to many, many men and woman who made incredible sacrifices ensuring victory in WWII.

The problem with films like Destination Tokyo, when seen two-thirds of a century after they were made, is how unrealistic they seem to a modern audience. Not necessarily the technical details, but the development of character, how the characters interact, the hammer blows with which the patriotic messages are driven home to an audience so less cynical and more trusting than today's, and the cringe-worthy sentimentality.Of course, whether this is a patriotic flag-waver or government-sponsored propaganda all depends on your perspective: yesterday's freedom fighters are today's terrorists, remember, killing our troops with the weapons we bought for them. No doubt the Japs were taught that all round-eyes were the spawn of the devil, intent on destroying their precious way of life in the same way that submarine officer Grant sincerely informs his men (and the US population) that all Japs thrust rifles into their children's hands almost as soon as they can walk. Today that's propaganda, inaccurate and misleading, but it served a purpose that was worthy and it was a lot more transparent than the misinformation our governments feed us today.Anyway, stepping away from the soapbox for a moment, I have to say that I didn't really enjoy this one. At 135 minutes it was overlong and filled with too many characters who were stereotypical even then. Only one of these characters dies, early on, stabbed in the back by a treacherous Jap whose life he is trying to save. Grant is too affable an actor to convince as a disciplined leader of men, and keeps thinking about his son's first haircut and coming over all misty-eyed. He also peers through his periscope with both eyes open. John Garfield plays an in-your-face ladies man, so aggressive in his assertion of his prowess you can't help wondering what personal problems lay beneath the surface to warrant all this braggadocio. Garfield has a doll on board which he is very fond of. Dane Clark, an actor very similar in stature and style to Garfield, is the hard-bitten atheist who finds spiritual enlightenment in the midst of Japanese depth charges. Clark is pretty good; I always liked him as an actor, and he never seemed to enjoy the success he perhaps deserved. Garfield smacks him often in the chest. There are other characters: a comedy cook, a lanky young greenhorn, etc. They get on famously, the way all men do in confined spaces.Technically the film stands up. The details on board were as accurate as the US navy could allow without giving away things they didn't want the enemy to know, and the story is filled with interesting little details.