There’s a moment near the end of a new documentary on the late U.S. Sen. Daniel Inouye, "Journey to Washington," that speaks volumes to Tomo Mizutani, president of Nitto Tire U.S.A., which sponsored the film.
The senator is at Mililani High School talking to students about his life. At one point he shares a story about trying to get a haircut while in Oakland, Calif., after World War II. A decorated combat veteran, Inouye had lost his right arm while serving with the Army’s 442nd Regimental Combat Team and was on his way home to Hawaii.
The barber refused to cut Inouye’s hair because he was Japanese. Inouye told him he was an American citizen.
"I had a hook on my right arm," Inouye tells the students. "And that wasn’t enough."
‘JOURNEY TO WASHINGTON’
The documentary will air several times Monday, which is Veterans Day: 7:30 and 10:45 p.m. on NGN1 and 7 p.m. on KIKU. It will also air at 8:40 a.m. Tuesday on NGN1. |
There’s a long pause before the senator speaks again.
"And I always tell future leaders like you that if I can make it, you can," Inouye says.
Inouye would go on to become Hawaii’s greatest political champion. He served in Washington since statehood in 1959, much of that time in the Senate. He was one of the most powerful politicians in America when he died last December.
In the senator Mizutani saw a moving story he could include in a documentary series he established in 2011 through Nitto. The Japanese company has sought to honor Japanese-American history and those who have had significant roles in the lives of Japanese-Americans, Mizutani said in a phone interview from Cypress, Calif.
Although Nitto is a Japanese tire company, the 52-year-old Mizutani believes the subjects of the documentaries, and the hardships they faced, have paved the way for companies such as Nitto to do business in the United States.
Nitto sponsored two previous documentaries — on former Colorado Gov. Ralph Carr, who defended the rights of Japanese-Americans in World War II, and on former U.S. Secretary of Transportation Norman Mineta, who drew from the internment experience of Japanese-Americans when he ordered airlines not to engage in racial profiling as a response to the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
"That last comment, my right arm was not enough, that really touched me," Mizutani said. "He put his best efforts to prove himself in the war, but he still has to prove himself more and more. I understand that. Many people can give up and transfer the blame to someone else, but he kept pushing himself."
Nitto hired a film crew that followed Inouye for months, but the senator’s busy schedule made it difficult and the crew was not finished when he died Dec. 17. Its footage contains the last lengthy interviews of Inouye’s life.
After his death, the film crew was allowed to shoot inside his suburban Washington, D.C., home where it was shown the senator’s piano. Inouye had learned to play piano as part of his rehabilitation decades earlier, and the documentary closes with Inouye performing "Danny Boy" onstage before an appreciative crowd.
"Even though he is dead, his philosophy is still alive," Mizutani said. "I think to focus on his philosophy is important: Never give up."
And that’s a wrap …
Mike Gordon is the Star-Advertiser’s film and television writer. Read his Outtakes Online blog at honolulupulse.com. Reach him at 529-4803 or email mgordon@staradvertiser.com.
