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Wonderful character development!

Very very predictable, including the post credit scene !!!

Terrible acting, screenplay and direction.

Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

You have to have lived in those times to understand them. Just starting junior high school, I was of the age to know this. The hatred and distrust of the Japanese was overwhelming. Furthermore, the war news during the first months was terrible and we needed those "feel good" movies. Hence, such films were necessary and popular. To judge the language and attitudes back then, by how we feel today, lacks understanding. Enough ships were blown up and enemy troops mowed down to satisfy us all. It was enjoyable to see some old favorites like George Tobias, Arthur Kennedy, Harry Carey, and especially, John Garfield. I might say that I never heard, seen, or read about Browning light machine guns fired from the hip as if this was usual practice. I loved the line that bombing the enemy fleet ( despite anti aircraft fire and Zeros) was going to be "fun.". Bravely said, in the movies.

John Ridgley plays Captain Mike "Irish" Quincannon, the pilot of a B-17 bomber (the Mary-Ann) whose crew includes crew chief Sergeant Robbie White (Harry Carey), co-pilot Lieutenant Bill Williams (Gig Young), bombardier Lieutenant Tommy McMartin (Arthur Kennedy), navigator Lieutenant "Monk" Munchauser (Charles Drake), assistant crew chief Corporal Weinberg (George Tobias), and radio operator Corporal Peterson (Robert Wood). There are two new additions made to the crew at the beginning of the film: a greenhorn youngster Private Chester (Ray Montgomery), and a "washed out pilot, now aerial gunner" Sergeant Joe Winocki, cynically played by (who else?) John Garfield.Evidently, there was a little intra-service rivalry within the Army between big plane crews and pursuit plane pilots in those days, so James Brown plays Lieutenant Tex Rader, a fighter pilot. Also recognizable in this film is Edward Brophy, as a Marine Corps Sergeant J. J. Callahan.It is December 6, 1941 as the film opens and a squadron of B-17s begins their journey from San Francisco to Hickam Field, Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The first part of the movie establishes the relationship between the crew members which is pretty much as a team familiar and comfortable with each other. Enter the new guys: Private Chester is a gung ho rookie excited about everything, Winocki is wise guy who rains on his parade and can't wait till his last three weeks in the service are up. Apparently, Winocki was a failure in flight school and it was Captain Quincannon, who signed the recommendation that ended his dream of being a pilot. The 20- year veteran crew chief Sgt. White doesn't like Winocki's attitude, especially because his son has just been promoted to Lieutenant Colonel within the ranks.Everything is pretty routine until Hickam Field's radio transmission goes out. The radio operator is able to pick up Japanese voices and background static which doesn't sound good, explosions etc.. When the squadron leader finally gets through to someone in Pearl Harbor, they are told to land at their pre-planned alternate locations. For the Mary-Ann, that means a short, rough runway on the Hawaiian island Maui. Though Captain "Irish" makes a good landing, there is some slight damage which must be addressed. However, while fixing the problem, they are shot at by, presumably, some local Japanese and must take off right away. They then must land on the bomb cratered runway at Pearl Harbor.After a successful landing at Hickam Field, they learn that Tommy's sister, who'd been dating co-pilot Bill, was injured in the attack. Part of the news is related to them by Tex, whom they don't respect from some history and the intra-service rivalry mentioned previously. They think Tex is partly to blame for Susan's condition and assume he was hiding out during the attack. They learn from the Colonel at Hickam Field, however, that Tex shot down four enemy planes (Zeros) before he himself was shot down in the action. They are then told that their new orders are to fly to Manilla, where the crew chief's son stationed, via Wake Island and asked to shuttle Tex to a pursuit wing stationed there.On the way to Wake Island, one gets a sense of just how difficult it was in those days to find a dot on the map without the advance navigation systems and radar of today. The crew is nervous, making the navigator anxious throughout the flight, about finding the island before their fuel runs out. Of course, everyone (including the navigator) is relieved when they do. Unfortunately, Wake too has been hit and after briefly refueling the exhausted, sleep deprived crew is told to leave before an impending Japanese invasion, when all on the island is expected to be lost. Several of the Marines on the island convince Weinberg to take their dog to save it from their fate.It is at this point that Winocki starts to become part of the crew. Once airborne, when the crew chief demands to know how a dog got onboard, Winocki says it was he that did it. Later, when the Mary- Ann makes it to the Philippines, it is Winocki who tells "Irish" that he wants to help and stay on as part of his crew. The Captain is glad, and says that first he must get rid of the dog (which he gives to the first Marine he sees, played by Brophy).More exciting action and interesting plot-line, much of it predictable to fans of this genre, make this film continue until it exceeds two hours on screen and the good guys deliver some comeuppance and payback at the Battle of the Coral Sea. This film, directed by Howard Hawks, won an Oscar for Best Editing and was nominated for B&W Cinematography, Special Effects, and Writing.

Air Force (1943)There are many reasons this is an important film, but there are a couple reasons why this isn't an especially watchable one.First, it's in the middle of the war, the big one, two years after Pearl Harbor and two years before Hiroshima. You can't expect anything but a slightly (or not so slightly) propaganda leaning movie. The fleet of flying fortresses (B-17 bombers) that make the basis for the movie are impressive machines, and the men are shown to be both competent and likable, good American boys and men. Director Howard Hawks had just finished "His Girl Friday" and "Ball of Fire," both comic masterpieces, and he was about to film "To Have and Have Not" with his buddy Humphrey Bogart. "Air Force" is not just a film between great films, it's made to the same high standards.You'll see some astonishing photography here, by James Wong Howe (who made some other war films along with a dozen masterpieces among his 136 features over a lifetime). Part of the filming is on the ground, with great light and shadow and framing, and part are airborne battle scenes, including shooting enemy planes in midair, very dramatically. And the editing, which won an Oscar, is conspicuously excellent. Not only are the normal continuity edits from scene to scene and shot to shot sharp and perfect, there are also many times (during battle scenes) where the editing turns to fast cuts, or montage, that is really first rate. It would seem avant-garde in a less militaristic world.What else to like? Well, the plot in its overview is fair enough, beginning with a chilling realization as the planes leave San Francisco that while flying to Hawaii the Japanese have attacked and they have nowhere to land. The emergency begins immediately. The actors, a few famous ones like John Garfield thrown in, are in good form, and the sense of group effort with the occasional disgruntled outsider is firmed up well.But, in the end, the movie almost unwatchable if you care at all about realism. I don't mean accuracy, but believability. The men are endlessly cheerful in an offhand way even as they are about to die, or the world is crumbling around them. They gather to talk or chitchat and the camera has them fit the frame with almost a parody of posing. This isn't war, this is a movie, it seems to shout. Well, fine, it's a movie, and so you never quite buy into it. The events are sometimes implausible, as well, and of course, things work out well over all. Too well.I have to say loudly that I understand why the movie was made this way. There was no room in 1943 in people's hearts or consciences for doubting and cynicism as people were being drafted, wounded, killed, and terrorized by actual battle, including battle from the air. But that doesn't mean it makes for relevant watching now. It's interesting, it's well made, it's important as part of how Americans saw the war through Hollywood's eyes, but it's also hard to get what it might have meant to home audiences back then.

Not only did Warner Brothers use the Boeing B-17 bomber as the centerpiece of one of its earliest battle front movies, "Flying Fortress," but the studio also used the bomber as an allegory for American tenacity in "Scarface" director Howard Hawks "Air Force." According to World War II film historian Lawrence Suid, Jack Warner approached U.S. Army Air Force (USAAF) commanding officer General Henry 'Hap' Arnold not long after Pearl Harbor about making a film about the USAAF. Suid says that Arnold approved Warner Brothers' request, and the War Department provided the studio with a plethora of information about their planes and pilots, which scenarist Dudley Nichols included in his original screenplay. Warner Brothers' studio chief Jack Warner hired aviation enthusiast Howard Hawks to direct "Air Force," and Hawks started shooting on June 18, 1942, at Drew Air Force Base in Florida and completed the picture four months later on October 26."Air Force" chronicles the routine flight of a B-17 Flying Fortress, nicknamed the 'Mary Ann,' from San Francisco to Hawaii. The crew consisted of an ethnically and geographically diverse group of men, a casting theme that recurred throughout World War II movies and reflected the melting pot identity of America. Unlike MGM's "Bataan" and Twentieth Century Fox's "Crash Drive" (1943), however, Warner Brothers never integrated African-Americans into the ranks of its battle front films.As the 'Mary Ann' approaches Honolulu, the crew hears Japanese gibberish on the radio and is even more shocked by the sight of Japanese planes dropping bombs and strafing the base. The Pearl Harbor flight tower diverts the 'Mary Ann' to Maui where it lands to repair a wheel. When Japanese-American snipers open fire on the fliers, the crew flies to Wake Island where the Marines are preparing their a gallant last stand. At Clark Field, the crew reloads their guns and ascends to battle the Japanese. The 'Mary Ann' is so badly riddled with bullet holes and the skipper so severely wounded that he orders everybody else to bail out. A recalcitrant gunner (John Garfield) who washed out of flying school ignores the skipper's orders and lands the bomber.Frantically, despite their orders to destroy it, the reunited crew patches up the plane. Not only do they load up with bombs, but they also remove the tail section and install a machine gun. The crew manages to get their B-17 off the ground before the Japanese overrun the island. During their flight to Australia, they sight a Japanese fleet, radio their position, and sink some of the ships. As the film draws to a close, the 'Mary Ann' survivors prepare to spearhead an aerial attack on Japan.At a time when the government restricted all Hollywood studios in terms of the money that they could spend on a film, the U.S. Army-Air Force's assistance proved invaluable in giving the film an aura of authenticity. For example, the nine B-17s seen in flight during the early scenes of Air Force were actually filmed on location in Florida by Warner Brothers. When the studio staged Japanese plane crashes and tricky B-17 landings in the jungle, the studio relied on miniatures. According to a War Department letter dated June 6, 1942, "It is the policy of the War Department not to allow soldiers or military equipment to be disguised and photographed as representing the personnel or equipment of foreign countries." The War Department sidestepped its own rule when it helped Warner Brothers produce Air Force. According to Suid, the War Department appointed Captain Samuel Triffy as technical adviser, and Triffy "flew both an Army two-place trainer and a fighter painted with the Rising Sun emblem in the combat sequences portraying Japanese attacks on American aircraft and military positions." Triffy sought as much as possible to ensure that Air Force appeared "as authentic as we could make it under the circumstances." All Howard Hawks' movies are about men bonding as a group. Women are few and far between in "Air Force,' but they populate the storyline. Dudley Nichols' screenplay with help from William Faulkner contains many good scenes. Some are tragic, such as the flight crew chief's story about his son, and some are funny, such as the dog that barks at Japanese. The death scene where the pilot takes off from his hospital bed with his companions helping him simulate this take-off to the big hangar in the sky is memorable. Today, "Air Force" seems quaint and corny, especially the aerial gunner's change of attitude. Initially, the John Garfield character doesn't plan to re-enlist, and he behaves like a complete prima donna, particularly because the 'Mary Ann's' pilot washed him out of pilot school, but the aerial gunner changes his mind when he see Pearl Harbor in flames.The U.S. Government propaganda agency, the OWI-BMP praised "Air Force" for five reasons. First, the crew constituted an ethnic melting pot. Second, the crew's perfect teamwork made the mission of the "Mary Ann" successful. Third, the officials applauded the fact that the filmmakers showered glory on an older mechanic sergeant who maintained the plane rather than on the younger more glamorous pilots. Fourth, as a combat picture, "Air Force" proved exciting without "the pitfall of showing too much blood and suffering." Fifth, the plot emphasized a good-natured rivalry between fighter pilots and bomber pilots. Ultimately, the OWI-BMP found the flaws in "Air Force" "serious but remediable; its good points are very good indeed—well worth the effort to revise the script so that it will perform a truly valuable service of war information." Altogether, "Air Force" is one of the best Allied propaganda movies of World War II.