Battle Hymn : Great air to air footage

Great air to air footage

You can almost feel the G's. Some of the best flying footage ever shot. Also, the shots of the NK's using the .50 mounted on the duece.5 were filmed with the shooter using live ammo.

Re: Great air to air footage

Agreed. Great scene.

Re: Great air to air footage

I guess I didn't appreciate the aerial scenes when I first saw this as a 24 year old, but now I think they were great.

Life, every now and then, behaves as though it had seen too many bad movies

Re: Great air to air footage

Let me preface this by saying that I know Colonel Dean Hess. (He's still alive and kicking in Ohio at the age of 93!) My best friend and I are both former USAF F-4 Phantom backseaters and novelists (although I'm as yet unpublished) and after a friend introduced us to him many years ago, Col Hess took us under his wing as literary proteges.

This is an Old School fighter pilot movie where they used real airplanes (in this case flown by real fighter pilots) and showed what real aerial combat looks like. The last such Old School movie was The Blue Max (1966). After that, there was a drought of 40 years during which there was nobody in Hollywood who had any clue as to what a real dogfight looks like, and the moviegoing public fell victim to George Lucas and other self-congratulatory special effects cartoonists of his ilk. (If you want to read my entire rant on that subject, please see http://www.lylefrancispadilla.com/pearl.html and scroll about halfway down the page.) The 2006 movie Flyboys is the only one to break that drought so far.

The only thing I have a problem with in the dogfight sequence is the way Lt Maples acts. First off, if he had a bandit on his tail and needed help, his voice would be about three octaves higher. But more importantly, a properly trained fighter pilot who is under attack by a single bandit at his Six and has sight of him shouldn't have to call for help (especially a P-51 being attacked by a Yak-9)! As often as I've seen this movie, I still simply cannot watch that sequence without screaming at Maples: "You're a g*ddam Instructor Pilot! It's called Defensive BFM [Basic Fighter Maneuvering]!"

Re: Great air to air footage

MadTom, your experience and knowledge on the subject is impressive. Thank you for sharing with us.

However, the scene you have a problem with is just another example of the Hollywood-izing of a real story. The film might depict dogfights accurately than most that Hollywood has produced recently, but from what I understand, the film takes many liberties with Hess' actual life. An example, he was a preacher before WWII, and did not become one after due to guilt.

The scene with Lt. Maples is in place to showcase Hess' struggle with his faith and his ability to kill during wartime. I'll admit, though, this scene also had me yelling at the screen, though my words were, "Save another life, Hess!". Decent film, overall. Next to "Strategic Air Command" (1955), it's a masterpiece.

http://www.idfilm.blogspot.com/

Re: Great air to air footage

What is amazing is how they let the North Koreans do damage to Hess's squadron in the air and on the ground. They never let the German Air Force do that to any American Air Force unit in any of the World War II and post World War II aerial Hollywood films that I have seen.

I thought the air combat scenes in the movie God is my Co-Pilot was excellent.

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I don't think there were very many opportunities for the German Air Force to actually attack the USAAF on the ground-maybe in Tunisia but in most cases the Germans were in a more defensive posture.

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Agreed; however, I don't recall the North Korean Air Force attacking a USAF base during the Korean War even at Colonel Hess's base.

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During the very early days of the Korean War, Nork Yaks (and IL-10 Sturmoviks, I think) attacked Kimpo airfield. I think at least one transport aircraft was destroyed by their strafing attacks.

Re: Great air to air footage

From what I know, there were at least four American aircraft destroyed on the ground by enemy aircraft in Korea: a C-54 at Kimpo (which you are referring to), a B-26 Invader and an F-82 Twin Mustang at Suwon (both of which had made emergency landings there earlier, I believe), and an F-86 (destroyed in a night raid by Po-2s at Suwon [the same raid caused damage to eight other Sabres]). I haven't actually seen Battle Hymn just yet (I caught a bit of it on TCM once, but I've been reluctant to seek out a DVD, as I've heard that the DVD omits some scenes), but can someone elaborate on the attack?

Re: Great air to air footage

That maybe be true but the point I was making was that in Hollywood World War II and post World War II air combat films, you did not see German aircraft attacking American fighter bases particularly after the Allies had landed in France and you had American air bases established to support the Allied advance in Northwest Europe.

Re: Great air to air footage

Oh that's quite true...even the vaunted fighter bomber 'tip & run' offensive by the Germans rarely hit viable airbases and it fizzled out by early 1943; of course there was that 'one time only' Bodenplatte massed attack on the tactical airfields, though I had heard that during Normandy some allied forward airstrips got some attention from Luftwaffe fighters.


Why can't you wretched prey creatures understand that the Universe doesn't owe you anything!?
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