A Majority of One

Bertha Jacoby, a widow living in Brooklyn, lost her only son in the war in the Pacific and carries the anger she has stored up against the Japanese. When her son in law is posted to Tokyo with the diplomatic service and the family decides to move, she reluctantly goes with them. Koichi Asano, the Japanese businessman she meets on the ship, lost his wife and children in the same war; the two approach each other first with courtesy and then with love. The family objects to the closeness, and the matter turns into a question of whether tolerance is only talk. Adapted from a play by Leonard Spigelgass, the film was later much criticised for giving the Japanese part to Alec Guinness and the Jewish part to Rosalind Russell. Mervyn LeRoy’s hundred and fifty six minute American production was completed in 1961.