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Thanks for the memories!

I like movies that are aware of what they are selling... without [any] greater aspirations than to make people laugh and that's it.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

One of the worst ways to make a cult movie is to set out to make a cult movie.

This past week I watched "Task Force" on Turner Classic Movies. What a great movie about US Naval Aviation, before and during WWII. For starters, the actors play their parts masterfully. You can tell that Gary Cooper really enjoys playing this character and telling this Navy story. I also liked how the movie had continuity of time, being that the story spanned many years. Perhaps most of all, I enjoyed the footage of the aircraft carriers themselves. I thought to myself, how the carriers that they were filming on, only a few years before 1949, were the centerpiece of the most horrific combat of WWII. I am sure many of the actors and those who saw the film remembered vividly when the news from the Battle of Midway and Okinawa reached home. So many young Americans died. What brought a tear to my eye, was the video at the end of the movie when the USS Enterprise is returning to NY City. The camera man at the time in 1945, films the damage with NYC icons like the Statue of Liberty and Brooklyn Bridge in the background. It is amazing footage. I thought to myself how the young veterans in the audience in 1949 must have reflected on their war fought only a few years before. Therefore, I love how this movie of history is indeed history itself.

Task Force gives an excellent account of the earlie years of carrier aviation, right from the 1922 Arms Limitation Conference and the old USS Langly through to the Korean war with the Essex class ships and the jet planes. I especially like that the movie features the real USS Saratoga and USS Enterprise. I think that the movie excellently shows the struggle to gain acknowledgement for carrier aviation, right up to the the attack on Pearl Harbour were the Japanese showed the U.S. how to utilize their carriers. Also the way certain characters has been in-cooperated in the script, the character of Pete Richards bears a striking recemblance to the life of Adm. Marc Mitcher, and also Adm. Yamamotos earlier assignments in Washington D.C. and old Captain Joe Reeves role in carrier aviation are brilliantly portrayed. Finally, Gary Cooper is an excellent choice of actor for the part of Captain Scott, his posture and seriousness makes fore a real officer and gentleman (there should also be something for the ladies !?)

If you have Turner Classic Movies, it would behoove you to take the time to watch Task Force, a fine, passionate, and patriotic film about the advent of the aircraft carrier as the principal weapon of the US Navy in World War II. Although it is a product of the times--and the Production Code--TF delivers the story of how "flat-tops" superseded the battleship as the principal tool for, in Navyspeak, "projecting power." With the skillful use of lots of film footage (which helped tremendously in avoiding the use of cheesy ship models), TF tells the story of a young naval officer played believably here by a much older Gary Cooper. As Cooper advances in his skill as an aviator, he runs afoul of bureaucrats and bullies, both outside the navy and in. This results in his being disciplined and scolded for speaking his mind about naval aviation, and his frustration with a lack of personal advancement and the navy not being prepared for future conflict. Cooper is a lanky metaphor for the advent of the carrier as the Queen of the Seas.With Pearl Harbor, Cooper's "Scottie" Scott is thrown into battle against an enemy that is much better prepared for air combat, and with the aid and leadership of his father figure, Walter Brennan, he (as metaphor) gains the recognition and ultimate victory he deserves.I read somewhere that Gary Cooper surrendered his chance at ultra-stardom when he made certain decisions about parts that robbed his film persona of the sort of sex appeal that would have guaranteed his place as a film star/sex symbol. The reviewer said something about Cooper being more of a big brother than a lover.I don't know if all this is true, but Cooper's image of being a friendly, decent, human hero is clearly seen in Task Force. He--and Brennan--carry this movie. The chemistry Coop has with his audience and his on-screen friend and C.O., Brennan, puts real blood and muscle into a movie that at times gets a bit too documentarian. Add in a sweet, loving performance by Jane Wyatt as the graceful and gracious military wife and you have a really human movie that works as history lesson, war film, political essay, and love story.Finally, what I love about this film is its innate patriotism. There simply is no questioning of America's place and motive in the years leading up to and during the Second World War. We were a democracy threatened by tyranny. We were unprepared for war because we despised it so very much; once confronted, we prevailed. The stock footage of Cooper's carrier (in real life, the badly damaged USS Franklin) arriving at New York with her flight deck and upper hull twisted into scrap metal by Japanese explosives is startling, a metaphor for the cost of not being prepared with the sort of cutting-edge technology, training, and will that might have reduced the bloodiness of the war or prevented it all together.

Gary Cooper does an excellent job playing a Gary Cooper-type character. This is one of the better WWII movies to come out of the 1940s era. Jane Wyatt and Walter Brennen also do a good job. Somehow, this film always gets a lower rating than it deserves. It is somewhat dated by today's standards but gives good background of naval aviation with some very good live action combat film footage. For another good 1940s era WWII action movie with lots of good gun camera shots, see "Fighter Squadron" with Edmund O'Brien and Robert Stack.