One of Our Aircraft Is Missing

Once again the Archers come through with a very entertaining picture. I think the film would be much more pertinent to, and was probably aimed at, WWII British audiences, but it is nevertheless top quality motion picture entertainment for either side of the Atlantic.

Although it starts out in a different vein than most - A British bomber flying unmanned until it crashes - there is surprisingly little action for a war picture and is mainly a character study about the airmen who bailed out of her. All parts are professionally done, especially Bernard Miles' and Godfrey Tearle's, and special mention must go to Googie Withers who labored in movies all those years with a funny name. It is she who takes acting honors in this one as the 'contact' posing as a Nazi sympathizer.

The World War II conflict in the European theater has provided an endless supply of thrilling and exciting movies with the Nazis as the natural 'bad guys', and here is another. Although they were not all as dim-witted as portrayed in movies, it is always fun to watch them come out on the short end. This film is well worth your time whether you are a war movie buff or not.

One of the best war films produced World War II, `One of Our Aircraft is Missing' is the product of one of the best British filmmaking teams of the 1940s, Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. The makers of such unusual and memorable films as `The Red Shoes' and `Black Narcissus', Powel and Pressburger's films were never like anyone else's. Their approach to a wartime propaganda film was equally different.

`One of Our Aircraft is Missing' begins dramatically with the crash of an RAF Vickers Wellington bomber designated `B-For Bertie', and then flashes back to the events leading thereto. The viewer is introduced to the six members of crew, and learns that they had actually bailed out of their crippled aircraft prior to the crash, landing in Nazi-occupied Holland. The remainder of the story describes their escape back to Britain.

What makes this film different from the conventional Hollywood treatment of similar subject matter is that `One of Our Aircraft is Missing' stresses the courage and resourcefulness of the Dutch civilians rather than the aircrew. Indeed, it made manifestly clear that the British crew could never have escaped without the assistance of a great many ordinary Dutch people of all ages and both sexes. The characters, both British and Dutch, are all well drawn Surprisingly enough, even the Germans are depicted as not entirely inhuman. `They want to be liked', says one Dutch patriot who has wormed her way into their confidence by posing as a Quisling.

From a historical perspective, this film is of interest due to its depiction of RAF Bomber Command operations during the early part of World War II, as well as details of the interior of the famous Wellington Bomber. It is also worth seeing as early example of the work of legendary film director David Lean (`Oliver Twist', `Bridge Over the River Kwai', `Lawrence of Arabia', Doctor Zhivago', Ryan's Daughter', etc), who served as Film Editor. There is also an early performance by a very young (and thin) Peter Ustinov, who acts in Dutch and Latin as well as English. All in all, this film is well worth a look.

Director Michael Powell's World War II-drama is a clever reworking of his "The 49th Parallel" (1941), a story of six German sailors marooned in Canada after their submarine is destroyed; the movie chronicles their failed attempt to cross over into then-neutral America. This time, in "One of Our Aircraft...," the heroes are six members of a British RAF bombing crew. We watch as they take off for the Continent and sample their conversation. However, after dropping their bombs on a Stuttgart industrial plant, their Wellington aircraft suffers a direct hit from German flak. The crippled plane flies as far as Nazi-occupied Holland before the crew decide to bail. The rest of the film chronicles their efforts to return to England, assisted by various Dutch civilians.

"One of Our Aircraft Is Missing" is Powell's wartime love letter to the Netherlands. The film opens with a close-up of a document, signed by the Dutch government-in-exile, informing us of the names of Dutch citizens who were executed for insurrection against Germany's Occupation - e.g., helping downed Allied fliers return to England. This visual device, the close-up of official paperwork, is repeated throughout the film. At certain intervals between episodes, Powell fills the screen with other documents and bureaucratic red tape - mostly applications to the Nazis, requesting permits to attend churches and soccer matches or to visit relatives in other villages. Off-screen, we hear the disgruntled commentary of a German Commandant as he stamps his reluctant approval on each application. The purpose of this motif is clear: to establish to British audiences what life in England would be like if overrun by an enemy with "an orderly mind." Thus, the whole film is a wartime morale-booster.

The crew represents an interesting cross-section of England: Sir George Corbett (played by Godfrey Tearle, who was the treasonous villain in Hitchcock's "The 39 Steps"), the "old man" WWI vet who wants to have another go at the Hun; Geof Hickman (Bernard Miles), the amiable Cockney; Frank Shelley (Hugh Williams), an actor; Tom Earnshaw (Eric Portman), a Yorkshire sheep breeder; Bob Ashley (Emrys Jones), a professional soccer-player; and the pilot, John Haggard (Hugh Burden), who bears resemblance to a younger version of the film's director, Powell. (Powell himself appears early in the film as an air-traffic controller - or "director" - reciting such lines as "Q for Queenie, you are now clear for takeoff.") The Dutch patriots are a fine, spirited lot: Pamela Brown and Googie Withers play two women who in large part are responsible for the downed fliers' safekeeping. Robert Helpmann, appears as a leering Nazi collaborator. And Peter Ustinov has a small role as a Catholic priest.

"B. for Bertie crashed on Sunday morning. 0431. But our story starts some fifteen hours earlier......."

With that simple statement Powell and Pressburger take us on another journey into cinema. A group of wise-cracking RAF crewmen take off on a routine bombing flight. The plane is shot and the crew manage to parachute off the before the plane stalls and crashes.

On the ground the men (minus the pilot) gather together. They first encounter a trio of children who ask "have you come to invade Holland?" The men are taken to the adults who debate about what to do with them.

Truly inventive film is well thought-out and photographed. Interest never wavers. What could have been a run-of-the-mill war film was skillfully crafted into a film of humanity in the midst of inhumanity.

Shameless Laudations!

Given that this movie was made about the then contemporary World War II times, without the benefit of a huge budget (compared to now), generations before computer graphics became the norm, it is refreshing to see a sensible depiction of those wartime conditions. Imagine making a picture of the bombing raids over Germany in the (I presume Mosquito) bombers, not known to be that secure from ground based A.A.C. fire— they could not fly higher, as could the later Lancasters. I feel the directors chose correctly in making it a character driven piece, with the action sublimated somewhat.

I caught this movie on a relatively new local TV station, it was one of their first offerings albeit in the early morning, I did not know about the movie before. What also surprised me was the appearance of later 'stars', Robert Helpmann, Peter Ustinov and Googie Withers, though she was fairly established by then. By co-incidence, I had viewed earlier that evening a British Documentary feature where the grandchildren of the original RAF bomber crew-members were to learn to actually fly a remaining WW II aircraft. And that reference was cool. The atmosphere exhibited in that doco, certainly the old time news clips, recent interviews of the veterans, rang true to the movie, especially with the actual ( or the perceived depiction if it was only that ) film of the raids over Germany and the resultant destruction.

The characterisations were laid back, as befits the RAF types, and the Dutch citizens, who organised the Resistance, were well played. Besides the unexpected cast members, there was another piece of 'recoginition' I found fascinating, and I hope it wasn't used in the film, (made in either 1941 or 1942, both are given in various sources), and gave away the Resistance as the war was only half over then. Of course the film makers had no idea how long the war would last or just what was in store for them. The pace of the film was a bit pedestrian, all the better I think, to enable the characters to be developed, and the bits of business the group had to 'endure' was fairly realistic, reasonably true to life. I guess there must have been some propaganda value in the movie as I couldn't imagine that opportunity would have been missed by the British authorities, maybe even instigated it, in league with the Dutch. I could hardly blame them.

All in all, I thought it was a fascinating movie, a benchmark. For others to come it also was a benchmark, to be creditable one had to do at least as well. Whether our later techniques make it easier, or convenient, or cost effective, or entertaining, or thought provoking, is a matter for our future, but looking back sixty odd years I think they produced a fine movie.