The explicit message in this film is that in 1943 every American should sacrifice for the World War Two war effort. A small group of troops defending a bridge against the Japanese army is symbolic of the actual attempt to delay Japanese victory as long as possible--time as a weapon, according to the prologue. Yet, action war movies do not operate on logic, and some of the delaying tactics are highly unlikely. The rebuilding of an old plane while under attack Japanese attack is just one example of the illogic of Hollywood. In one sense, this film is little more than the Alamo replayed, this time in the Pacific instead of Texas. Still, the movie qualifies as a good propaganda film for the Homefront, especially since American forces were suffering their greatest defeats in the history of the Republic about the time of the fall of Bataan. Hollywood cannot turn defeat into victory, but it can claim, and does in this film, that the course of history was changed by the heroic defenders of Bataan. Like the Alamo, it does not "matter where a man dies as long as he dies for freedom." In war, one can always find a place to die.
