Three Came Home

1950
Approved
1h 46m

IMDb RATING

YOUR RATING

Claudette Colbert in Three Came Home (1950)

During Word War II, American author Agnes Newton Keith is imprisoned by the Japanese in various POW camps in North Borneo and Sarawak.During Word War II, American author Agnes Newton Keith is imprisoned by the Japanese in various POW camps in North Borneo and Sarawak.During Word War II, American author Agnes Newton Keith is imprisoned by the Japanese in various POW camps in North Borneo and Sarawak.

Director
- Jean Negulesco
Writers
- Nunnally Johnson
- Agnes Newton Keith
Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

7.3/10

2.3K

YOUR RATING

Director
- Jean Negulesco
Writers
- Nunnally Johnson
- Agnes Newton Keith
Stars

See production info at IMDbPro

Awards
- 1 win total

Photos30

+ 22

Top cast90

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Claudette Colbert

Agnes Newton Keith

Patric Knowles

Harry Keith

Florence Desmond

Betty Sommers

Sessue Hayakawa

Colonel Michio Suga

Sylvia Andrew

Henrietta Thomas

Mark Keuning

George Keith

Phyllis Morris

Sister Rose

Howard Chuman

Lieutenant Nakata

John Burton

Elderly Resident
(uncredited)

Melinda Casey

English Girl
(uncredited)

Campbell Copelin

English Radio Announcer
(uncredited)

Leslie Denison

English Radio Announcer
(uncredited)

Devi Dja

Ah Yin
(uncredited)

Frank Emi

Japanese Soldier
(uncredited)

Doreen Mary English

Woman Prisoner
(uncredited)

Stanley Fraser

Englishman
(uncredited)

Alex Frazer

Dr. Bandy
(uncredited)

Jerry Fujikawa

Japanese Soldier
(uncredited)

Director
- Jean Negulesco
Writers
- Nunnally Johnson
- Agnes Newton Keith
All cast & crew
Production, box office & more at IMDbPro

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Storyline

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Did you know

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Trivia
Agnes Newton Keith, the writer of the book on which this film was based, wrote a letter about the film and its critical response. The letter was published in 'The New York Times' on 26 March 1950. It reads: "...I find that one or two critics (not 'The New York Times') question why the story was written....I wrote 'Three Came Home' for three reasons: For horror of war. I want others to shudder with me at it. For affection of my husband. When war nearly killed me, knowledge of our love kept me alive. And for a reminder to my son. I fought one war for him in prison camp. He survives because of me....The Japanese in 'Three Came Home' are as war made them, not as God did, and the same is true of the rest of us."

Goofs
Colonel Suga says he attended the University of Washington for four years and Agnes reveals that she attended Berkeley. Suga goes on to say that Cal "murdered" Washington's football team. However, Tatsugi Suga arrived at Washington in 1924 and during the next four seasons California never defeated Washington. Only one football game would fit Suga's description: a 33-0 loss in 1933.

Quotes
[first lines]
Agnes Newton Keith: Six-degrees north of the Equator, in the heart of the East Indies, lies Sandakan, the tiny capital of British North Borneo. In Sandakan in 1941, there were 15 thousand Asiatics, 79 Europeans, and 1 American. I was the American. My name is Agnes Keith. I was born in Oak Park, Illinois, and graduated from the University of California at Berkeley. My husband is Harry Keith, a colonial official of British North Borneo. Borneo became my home when Harry and I were married. And it was in Sandakan that I bore one child, and lost another. And it was in Sandakan that we waited - 45 white men, 24 wives, and 11 children - through the anxious days of 1940 and '41. Certain only of one thing: that sooner or later, Japanese guns would join in the thunders of war, and Japanese troops would come down through the East Indies. The men waited because it was their duty; the women because it was their choice.

Connections
Edited into Your Afternoon Movie: Three Came Home (2023)

Soundtracks
You Say the Sweetest Things (Baby)
(uncredited)
Music by Harry Warren
Played on the radio before and after the news flash regarding Pearl Harbor

User reviews52

Review

Featured review

7/10

Well acted and remarkably temperate

Good performances and scripting enhance this tale of hardship and endurance set in a Japanese internment camp in Borneo during World War II. Miss Colbert's performance in particular is always convincing and often riveting. Also noteworthy is Sessue Hayakawa's sensitive portrayal of the outwardly stern but inwardly humane Col. Suga.

Considering that this film was released only five years after the end of World War II, when anti-Japanese feeling was still very much present in the U.S., it's surprising that the horrors of life in Japanese captivity aren't played up more. Several instances of casual and calculated brutality are shown, but there is little here to compare with the shocking (and realistic) scenes in the much more recent film "Paradise Road." And the range of characterizations among the Japanese should be a welcome surprise to those who dismiss wartime and postwar American attitudes as uniformly jingoistic and racist. Yes, some of the Japanese are wantonly cruel, but others are obviously sympathetic to the prisoners, and as noted above, Col. Suga emerges not only as a reasonable commander but also as a noble man who can resist the temptation to take out his own grief and anger on the prisoners. Sadly, there were few men like Col. Suga in the real Borneo camps.

One unfortunate oversight: the action of the film covers almost four years of imprisonment and deprivation, but the prisoners appear just about as well-fed and energetic at the end as when they arrived.