The Flying Missile

It Never Ceases to Amaze.

The Parade of Never-Ending Boasting from the Governmental Influence on Hollywood in the Post-WWII Years.

Taking Victory-Lap After Victory-Lap at the Expense of Good Taste and Humility.

Yes We (the Allies) Defeated Evil in Another Us vs Them Slaughter for the Sake of Saving Humanity from Itself.

We Won the War...Hurrah.

A Good Example of the Hollywood Unbridled Assault on Movie-Goer Sensibility and Tolerance,

is those Prolog "Government is Your Friend" Embarrassments that got Tacked-On Otherwise Good Movies.

Some "Authority Figure" Reading from Cue-Cards About this and that to Pacify and Glorify.

Back to this Movie.

It is a Forgotten-Film and Deserves the Neglect.

Wasting Glen Ford and other Valuable Resources the Movie Plays-Out Like a Military Training Short.

Void of Creativity and Any Entertainment Value.

File this One in the Dust-Bin of Hollywood History with those Other Obsoletes.

Because this Contains Absolutely Nothing Worth Anyone's Time..

The film is worth watching for Viveca Lindfors, who plays the most important part, in cajoling a war invalid back to life. That's the only human part of this war chronicle. It's all about testing missiles, and both Glenn Ford and Viveca Lindfors are agreed that this missle business is just awful, they just heartily dislike it, and so does her uncle. Still they go through with the project, Viveca losing her job in the bargain and Glenn ending up a cripple, but the interesting bit is how he returns to life in spite of his bitterness, total frustration and sense of guilt because of the loss of the life of his closest mate, for which he blames himself, and he is not altogether wrong in doing so. One small mistake in precarious ventures like this, and it can all go to blazes, which it does, but Viveca saves the situation. It's a rather humdrum ordinary cliché-kind sort of chronicle of no special interest, while you have to admit that Viveca Lindfors at least is beautiful.

Submarine commander Glen Ford wants in on the new guided missile program that Admiral Henry O'Neill is trying to get funding for. Ford also wants O'Neill's secretary, Viveca Lindfors. Neither goal is as easy to attain as he imagines, despite the conniving of his quartermaster, Joe Sawyer.

Glen Ford always looks realistic in a Naval uniform, even though he was a Marine during the Second World War. As for the impulse behind this movie, I suspect that the cooperation of the Navy was motivated in part to get Congressional funding for their guided missile program. Although the script goes pretty gar into the sacrifices-our-boys-make-for-this-country territory, it's mostly standard fare with some good shots of missiles taking off and passing over a flotilla. Director Henry gets good performances out of a cast that includes John Qualen, Jerry Paris, and Paul Harvey.

This movie like so many old movies shows the relationship between officers and enlisted men as a bunch of friendly guys working together. This is not factual. Even on these tiny WWII subs, the enlisted men and officers were kept apart. The officers had their own separate mess and cook. Officers never fraternized with enlisted men. If you have never been in a WWII sub, it is informative. Even in these incredibly close quarters Naval discipline was enforced. In several scenes in this movie the sub Commander greets enlisted men as if they were high school pals. The real Navy was not at all like McHale's Navy.

I don't know about you, but I always found Glenn Ford a rather dull actor to watch. He wasn't bad, just unremarkable - and this maritime adventure sort of confirms that. He is a determined (bolshy) US Naval Commander who is convinced of the merits of launching missiles from submarines - despite scepticism from the upper echelons - and so sets out to coax, cajole and bulldoze his theories through. Viveca Lindfors "Karin" provides the love interest, and indirectly some of the conflict as her father is a devout pacifist. The end result is never in jeopardy and to a certain extent the film smacks of willy-waving at the Soviets in the immediate (1950) aftermath of WWII - with scant regard to fact. I tend to like submarine adventure films (usually because they are exciting and there is normally an absence of slushy love scenes) but this doesn't really satisfy either of my criteria and so whilst it's not rotten, it's almost as bad - it's bland.