Bombardiers en piqué

While Dive Bomber has some formulaic elements, it is a glorious technicolor view of US naval aviation just before the US entered World War II. The air sequences include shots of aircraft (Vindicators, Devastators, Curtiss Hawks, etc.) that soon became obsolete and that I have never seen in any other technicolor film. The carrier scenes are set on the USS Enterprise the year before this ship fought in the Midway and Guadalcanal battles. The film is shot on location in San Diego, and I noticed landmarks like the Hotel Del Coronado and the Cabrillo lighthouse in the background. Thanks to Turner Classic Movies for playing this.

Fred MacMurray is a Navy flight instructor. Errol Flynn is a Navy doctor who signs up for flight doctor training. Ralph Bellamy is Flynn's gruff superior. These personalities clash but eventually earn each other's respect and join forces. Their big problem: How to prevent blackouts and high altitude sickness in fighter plane pilots.

Outstanding photography and stirring music back up the excellent star performances in this high class Warner Bros. production. The opening sequence contains amazing footage of the fleet in Hawaiian territory (less than a year before Pearl Harbor); the skies are filled with impressive planes and maneuvers throughout the picture, right through to a beautiful closing shot.

Flynn is totally charismatic in a role that's less flamboyant than his usual swashbuckler but no less heroic. Bellamy's lead doctor approaches his job with gravity and complete dedication. MacMurray is brash, demanding, loyal to both his work and his men.

The solid supporting cast includes Regis Toomey in a good role as MacMurray's pilot buddy. Not essential to the plot but adding pizzazz are Alexis Smith as a sort of off-and-on love interest and Allen Jenkins as a corpsman who spends the picture hiding from his wife. Cliff Nazarro also contributes comic relief with his double-talk bit.

Plot and dialog are solid...but this picture's main appeal is that everything in it just looks so good.

I have to side with those who have said the real stars are the pristine U.S. Naval aircraft of 1941, most still wearing the colorful prewar markings. But Flynn is always enjoyable, especially at this stage of his career, and he does a great job of playing off his cool Navy doctor personality against Fred MacMurray's hard bitten naval aviator.

There are some interesting Hollywood shortcuts in the film. As Swede Larson's Vindicator dive bomber goes into its fatal dive over Hawaii, the air gunner is seen in the rear seat. The crash is convincing, probably done with a large scale model, but the wreckage appears to be cobbled up from bits and pieces (Lockheed Vega tail) and doesn't even vaguely resemble a Vindicator. The fate of the air gunner is not addressed - maybe he was smart enough to have bailed out? Anyway he conveniently disappeared. The role of the enlisted troops in Naval Aviation is conveniently ignored, except for the hospital corpsmen.

I think the comedic interlude with Nazarro double-talking "Lucky's" wife is quite charming and reminiscent of Ronald Reagan's double talk with Raymond Massey's Nazi in DESPERATE JOURNEY. To the critics of this I say it was a 1940's thing; THEY thought it was funny. People today will already find Kelly McGillis's character with her seamed stockings and leather flight jacket already dated and corny in 1980s' TOP GUN. That's show biz; let it go.

Several shots aboard the USS ENTERPRISE show TBDs catching the wire on landing but the camera is angled up for "security" to avoid showing details of the Vindicators' arresting gear. So to answer those who talk about security obviously the Navy did throw in a few restrictions.

The "diving suit" high altitude gear is pure fantasy. But then, it's a movie.

Note for the "rough landing" by the bit player flight surgeon where a plane goes bouncing all over the field, a U.S. Navy N3N trainer is NOT abused in that way. A civilian biplane (possibly a Great Lakes) is repainted to resemble an N3N (and they got the national insignia too small).

For those who claim the film was NOT shot at North Island in San Diego, please note Flynn flies past the Del Coronado Beach Hotel. I knew two old men who were in the Navy and USMC and were stationed there and have fond memories of the movie. After the filming was complete, the film crew staged a big beer bust for all of the men who took part in helping make it. I was stationed there 30 years after the movie was made and a lot of the base still looked that way.

One puzzling thing, at the "Graduation" from Flight Surgeon School, the Navy band plays "SEMPER PARATUS," the U. S. Coast Guard march. The "Dive Bomber March" by Max Steiner, used throughout the movie, was good enough to be re-used later for the Robert Stack P-47 movie FIGHTER SQUADRON, as well as John Wayne's WW-2 sub flick, OPERATION PACIFIC

In many respects, this film is really a documentary of U.S. Naval Aviation in 1941 with a superficial film plot thinly superimposed. But it's a treasure!

As a snapshot of the US military on the eve of Pearl Harbor, this has a poignancy that it didn't have on original release. The "Enterprise" has a starring role, just two years before Midway (and incidentally, notice how SMALL the carriers are: I guess jet fighters needed vastly bigger ships).

And look at the aircraft: innumerable biplanes, and the rest of them already obsolete. No combat (- and, in fact, no bombs, which is odd, tho' i guess in 1941 the idea of Americans actually dropping nasty weapons like bombs was still a controversial notion.) Lots of formation flying: (this is Warners, after all, the home of Busby Berkeley!) Almost every outdoor scene has a flight of real aircraft zooming through it: the effect is sumptuous, and makes even "The Battle of Britain" look very small beer. Much credit to Michael Curtiz and crew for stage-managing all this.

There are no real surprises in the plot, though it moves through the clichés at an agreeable pace; nonetheless, it's an interesting commentary on the days when flying was not a "routine" activity.

But the reason to watch this is the photography. This is a Technicolor show-piece. The aerial footage is downright glamorous, and many of the interior scenes are filled with interest (though interior lighting problems are apparent, particularly in Flynn's make-up).

Plot-wise, the focus wanders back and forth from Flynn to MacMurray, which leaves both characters slightly unfinished. Flynn was obviously very difficult for Americans to write for: this actually sounds like Bogart dialogue. Flynn looks embarrassed and diffident throughout(he's very good though, and his voice is beautiful). Alexis Smith is fun; possibly the only interesting twist in the script is that the women are both unredeemed ratbags: the slush component is, hence, lower than it would be once hostilities commenced. Ralph Bellamy is good, doing the transition from "guy who doesn't get the girl" to "gruff character actor".

Modern viewers will laugh at the chain-smoking doctors (especially the one with the heart problem).

Max Steiner's score doesn't grab me particularly, but there are some nifty musical effects during the "blackout" sequences.

This film is beautifully shot with incredible Technicolor photography of pre-WW 2 Navy aircraft in all their glory. (Note- Navy planes were purposely painted in bright colors to facilitate rescue at sea.)

Unfortunately there are a lot of annoying factors to the plot such as Allen Jenkins' alleged comic relief and some pretty unbelievable dialogue. Errol Flynn and Fred MacMurray spend a lot of time on manly stiff-upper-lip dialogue that is unbelievably stilted. There is a lot of real aviation medicine mixed in with some bogus movie baloney (the pressure suit they come up with is kind of a steal from round-the-world pilot Wiley Post). Navy pilots never used anything like that suit or the pressure belt in that time period. The film was actually shot at NAS North Island on Coronado island with the cooperation of the Navy.

If you want to see the kind of planes the Navy was flying in the late 30's, though, there is no better film. Look for the Consolidated Coronado 4-engine flying boat in one scene- a flying dinosaur!