"Kukan": The Battle Cry of China
Cast & Crew
Niles Welch
C. Bellante
Sam Citron
Edward Craig
Herbert T. Edwards
Gerald Holland
Film Details
Technical Specs
Synopsis
In order to document on film the Chinese resistance to the Japanese invasion, newspaperman Rey Scott flies to Haiphong and there makes arrangements to join a truck caravan over the Burma Road into China. Supplies of all kinds are transported by truck, cart, boat and men over the road, which was built in less than fourteen months. Scott notes that different tribal groups along the road are united by their struggle against the Japanese and visits with guerrilla soldiers. Scott sees whole factories that were carried piece by piece thousands of miles inland from the coast to protect them from attack. Scott meets with Madame Chiang Kai-shek, who is supervising thousands of refugee children, and with Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek, both at home and with his soldiers. At the Cheng Doo campus of West China University, student refugees from the bombed coast continue their studies. Industrial co-operatives, owned and managed by the workers, work to provide the supplies that China needs to fend off the Japanese. After visiting the co-operatives, Scott encounters a panda. In the northwest, Scott sees the 4,000 mile "Red Route," over which the Soviet Union sends supplies to the Chinese. Other supplies travel from China's fertile farmlands down the Yalu River to Lanchow. Some products are transported on inflated goatskin rafts, which can carry from fifteen to fifty tons of produce. In Kokonor, Scott visits the part of the country inhabited by Muslims and Lamas. From Sinning, Scott approaches Tibet, the home of one of China's oldest religions. At the Lamasery at Kum Bum, Scott witnesses Buddhist rituals and ceremonies. When Scott returns to Lanchow, he receives word of the imminent bombing of Chungking and hurries there by plane. The bombing destroys the city, but as soon as the fires are put out, the people, who are sheltered in the rocky hillsides, return to take up the task of rebuilding.
Film Details
Technical Specs
Quotes
Trivia
Notes
The above credits were taken from a cutting continuity deposited with the Coypright Office. According to the Variety preview review, the film ran 135 minutes. The The Exhibitor review gives the running time as 90 minutes. A 63 minute version was released in July 1942, and the cutting continuity used to catalog this film appears to document the 63 minute version. Reviews of the longer version complained about the film's length and crude production values. The film's opening title card reads: "Rey Scott's 'Kukan': The Battle Cry of China." Scott's onscreen credit reads: "Photographed and written by Rey Scott."
According to the New York Times review, "Kukan" can be roughly translated as "courage." An article in the September 23, 1941 issue of Look stated that during the bombing of Chungking on 19 and August 20, 1940, 370 planes dropped 200 tons of bombs in thirty minutes. Scott filmed the bombing from the roof of the American Embassy, located across the river from Chungking, according to a 1941 discussion guide distributed by the Motion Picture Committee of the Department of Secondary Teachers of the National Education Association. A October 22, 1941 Los Angeles Daily News article reported that the film, which was later used for classroom study, took four years to make, including two years of pre-production. Although contemporary reviews note that the film was projected in 16mm, according to a May 1942 newsletter included in the file on the film at the AMPAS Library, footage was shot on 16mm film and enlarged to 35mm for theatrical release. Scott received a special Academy Award citation for "his extraordinary achievement in producing Kukan."
