By Wu Qiaoxi | 2025-08-29

Chinese movies revisiting the agonies of World War II are raising concerns that Beijing is deliberately stoking nationalism and anti-Japanese fervor.

Marking 80 years since the war ended, the Chinese film Dead to Rights, depicting the Nanjing Massacre, grossed more than 2.7 billion CNY ($377.5 million) within a month of its July release.

The massacre lasted from December 1937 to January 1938. Occupying Japanese soldiers killed hundreds of thousands of Chinese and raped untold numbers of girls and women.

The film topped China's summer box office. But a surge of similar titles has observers concerned just what Beijing wants to communicate.

From August, the movie expands overseas, with releases in the Asia-Pacific, North America and beyond.

According to Xinhua, Dead to Rights is based on the true story of a Nanjing photo studio apprentice who, while developing film for Japanese officers, discovered images of atrocities.

He risked his life to preserve photos that later served as evidence against Japanese war criminals and are now housed in China's Second Historical Archives.

Children and adults erupt in rage

The film's depiction of Japanese war crimes unleashed a new wave of anti-Japanese sentiment.

Videos circulating on social media showed viewers standing with tears in their eyes after a screening and, prompted by agitators onstage, shouting the movie's famous line: "Not an inch of our vast land shall be surrendered."

Many parents brought their children to the movie for "patriotic education." Instead, some children broke down emotionally, crying out to their mothers, "I want to kill all the Japanese."

School-age children were heard declaring, "I hate the Japanese! When I grow up, I want to join the army and shoot them all!" or "I want to beat the Japanese to death!"

Xinhua, citing local reports from Henan, China, described how a nine-year-old boy, after watching the film, cut up his treasured collection of Japanese anime cards. The article no longer can be found on Xinhua's website.

The reactions have led many netizens to question whether the film is spreading hatred. On July 31, the Global Times published an editorial condemning such criticism. It decried "cyber bullying" of the film.

But that same day, "a Japanese national walking with a child was struck by what appeared to be a rock by an unknown assailant inside a Suzhou ... subway station," the Japanese Embassy in Beijing said in a statement.

Police apprehended a suspect, the Chinese Foreign Ministry told AFP.

Pattern of assaults on Japanese

This was not an isolated attack on Japanese residents in China.

In June 2024, a man with a knife injured a Japanese mother and her child and killed a Chinese woman at a bus stop in Suzhou. The woman was an attendant on the bus that the Japanese child would have taken to school. She had tried to stop the attacker.

Later that September, a man stabbed a Japanese boy on his way to school in Shenzhen. The boy died the following day.

Several patriotic films with themes similar to those of Dead to Rights have recently come out or will be released on dates with special significance.

For instance, Mountains and Rivers Bearing Witness and Scholars under Fire were released on August 15, the anniversary of Japan's surrender. Against All Odds is scheduled for release on September 3, the anniversary of the day in 1945 when the Republic of China declared victory in the war against Japan. 731 is scheduled for release September 18, the anniversary of the Mukden Incident in 1931.

Official media have touted these films as "highlighting the great spirit of the War of Resistance ... based on real historical events."

The rapid release of these films has raised concerns of more violence against Japanese.

Akio Yaita, a Japanese journalist based in Taiwan, wrote on X that his Japanese friends living in China had warned their relatives and friends: "It would be better not to come to China in the near future. Even in Japan, it would be better not to go to places with large Chinese populations."

Pushing nationalism

Chinese state media are fostering an "anti-Japanese" atmosphere nationwide in conjunction with a military parade to be held September 3 to commemorate the 80th anniversary of the Chinese victory over Japan, said Yaita.

Films like Dead to Rights reflect Chinese leader Xi Jinping's "incitement of narrow-minded nationalism since coming to power," said political commentator Lin Pao-hua, according to Liberty Times.

"[We] should face historical facts rationally and avoid exaggeration, sensationalism and selectively misleading," Lee Hsiao-feng, professor emeritus at National Taipei University of Education, said on Facebook.

Beijing has intensified its propaganda campaign to promote a "correct view" of World War II, portraying China and the USSR as decisive victors, Reuters reported August 22.

China's wartime resistance has been "selectively ignored and underestimated," while the Chinese Communist Party (CCP)'s role was "deliberately belittled and vilified," a commentary in People's Daily said.

Meanwhile, Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) accused Beijing of "repeatedly distorting the facts" of wartime history, stressing that the People's Republic of China "did not exist at all" during the Republic of China's war against Japan.

The CCP has falsely claimed it led the resistance and even used the narrative to assert that Taiwan belongs to China, said MAC chairman Chiu Chui-cheng.

The MAC barred Taiwanese officials and national security personnel from taking part in Beijing's September 3 parade.