THE LAST BULLET – 1995
This excellent Australian television film is about the Borneo Campaign of 1945. This was the last major Allied campaign in the South West Pacific during the Second World War.
The film is set during July 1945 just before the end of the Pacific conflict. The Australian Army has defeated the main Japanese forces, and are now engaged in mopping up operations. The war has come down to small unit actions in the dense Borneo jungles.
A new replacement, Jason Donovan, has joined one of the platoons out searching for the remaining Japanese. At the same time, a group of 40 or so Japanese are about to launch a Banzi attack on an Australian position further inside the jungle. The attack is repelled with only two Japanese surviving.
The two make their way deeper into the dense forest to hide. They come upon an old abandoned bunker. They find some old rice to chow down on. This beats the bamboo sprouts and bugs they have been living on. By this time in the war the Japanese merchant fleet had been wiped out. No supplies were getting through to bases on the Pacific outposts.
Donovan's patrol is making a sweep through the forest and come up on the two Japanese, Kôji Tamaki and Kazuhiro Muroyama. Tamaki is a sniper with a scoped rifle. The two Japanese soldiers manage to ambush the Australian patrol. They wipe out the patrol except for Donovan. Muroyama is also killed in the battle.
Now the two enemies spend the next two days and nights trying to kill the other. Both have sniping rifles and both are wounded in the fire exchange. There is a real game of cat and mouse here as each tries to finish the other. Grenades and rounds are exchanged till both are down to their last bullet. What happens now? This one is a down and dirty war film, showing just how quick and bloody death can come.
For a film made on a television budget, this one is better than you would expect. It was well worth the 90 minutes spent watching.
This excellent Australian television film is about the Borneo Campaign of 1945. This was the last major Allied campaign in the South West Pacific during the Second World War.
The film is set during July 1945 just before the end of the Pacific conflict. The Australian Army has defeated the main Japanese forces, and are now engaged in mopping up operations. The war has come down to small unit actions in the dense Borneo jungles.
A new replacement, Jason Donovan, has joined one of the platoons out searching for the remaining Japanese. At the same time, a group of 40 or so Japanese are about to launch a Banzi attack on an Australian position further inside the jungle. The attack is repelled with only two Japanese surviving.
The two make their way deeper into the dense forest to hide. They come upon an old abandoned bunker. They find some old rice to chow down on. This beats the bamboo sprouts and bugs they have been living on. By this time in the war the Japanese merchant fleet had been wiped out. No supplies were getting through to bases on the Pacific outposts.
Donovan's patrol is making a sweep through the forest and come up on the two Japanese, Kôji Tamaki and Kazuhiro Muroyama. Tamaki is a sniper with a scoped rifle. The two Japanese soldiers manage to ambush the Australian patrol. They wipe out the patrol except for Donovan. Muroyama is also killed in the battle.
Now the two enemies spend the next two days and nights trying to kill the other. Both have sniping rifles and both are wounded in the fire exchange. There is a real game of cat and mouse here as each tries to finish the other. Grenades and rounds are exchanged till both are down to their last bullet. What happens now? This one is a down and dirty war film, showing just how quick and bloody death can come.
For a film made on a television budget, this one is better than you would expect. It was well worth the 90 minutes spent watching.