Baseball Behind Barbed Wire (film)

Documentary film on baseball in camp with a particular focus on the story of Issei baseball pioneer Kenichi Zenimura and Gila River . Filmmaker Yuriko Gamo Romer builds the story around interviews with Nisei Baseball Research Project Director Kerry Yo Nakagawa and Zenimura biographer Bill Staples, Jr., along with archival interviews with Tets Furukawa and Howard Kenso Zenimura, two Nisei who played under Zenimura, the latter interviews being augmented by Sabina Kariat's animation.

Filmmaker Romer formed Flying Carp Productions in 1998. Her prior documentaries have included Occidental Encounters (1998), on Japanese American interracial marriages and Mrs. Judo: Be Strong, Be Gentle, Be Beautiful (2013), on judo pioneer Keiko Fukuda. While making a feature length documentary titled Diamond Diplomacy , Romer came across the story of Japanese American baseball in the concentration camps and began separately making Baseball Behind Barbed Wire in 2020. Funding from the film came from the Japanese American Confinement Sites Grant Program , the California Civil Liberties Public Education Program , the Tomoye Takahashi Charitable Foundation, Nisei Baseball Research Project, Nancy P. and Richard K. Robbins Family Foundation, and Brown Girls Doc Mafia's Feedback Loop Program.

Might also like Diamonds in the Rough: Zeni and the Legacy of Japanese-American Baseball (1999); American Pastime (2007); Day of Independence (2003)