A Disgrace... - Memphis Belle (1990) Discussion

[–] ORGaSMOTRON 17 years ago

Ease up man, its all entertainment. Directing isnt easy on a small scale, so how complicated must it be for real? Think of that before you start handing out "directorial tips".

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[–] coppolas_cocaine-1 17 years ago

He may be harsh, but I agree with him, this movie was not very good. And its not how hard it is to make a movie, its the results that wind up onscreen. Making bad movies is hard and making good movies is even harder. Making a great movie is an act of god.

I thought Michael Caton-Jones did a better job directing with ROB ROY.
MEMPHIS BELLE just felt terribly cliched.

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[–] aimless-46 11 years ago

I thought the movie was fine but I agree that it was peppered with inaccuracies. The early segment cited by the OP (the damaged plane blowing up on landing) was done to set-up the climatic scene where they struggle to get the landing gear down. A plane coming in with no bombs and minimal fuel would not have blown up in that manner immediately after landing.

Likewise the newly arrived bomber crew would not have had a young master sergeant; no master sergeant would have been that young, especially one without combat experience.

And there are about a hundred of these fabrications, most of which (unlike the first one) serve no purpose other than to showcase the ignorance of the writers.

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[–] lysander-6 17 years ago

While I don't deny that this film is far from error-free, your particular criticism is somewhat flawed. If you pay attention, when they first attempt to put down the landing gear and only one wheel drops, the captain clearly says "well take it back up, we'll belly land." at which point they realize that the wheel is stuck in the deployed position. That's why they have to manually crank down the second wheel.

I'd argue that this film was intended to depict the fear and constant sense of looming mortality that was experienced by WWII bomber crews. With that objective in mind, I'd say it was fairly effective, all inaccuracies aside. I rather enjoyed it.

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[–] searchingforsoldat 17 years ago

I will agree that this movie was not perfect, but when you've seen it as many times as I (I lost track after 700) you realize what a well-made movie it is. It didn't have as many special effects that you would seen in modern movies, for it was made in the late 80's, when computers could only proces rough effects, I did not see many effects in this movie that were used in modern movies such as pearl harbor, with photoshopped and blue-screened in explosions. Remember, its fiction based on fact, and some things were changed to either make the movie unique or to prevent a lawsuit. Still, a great movie, worth watching 700 more times.

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[–] 17 years ago

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[–] Flibbetygiblet 17 years ago

"They could have told the true story of the REAL crew of the Memphis Belle and would have had a great movie"

You never ruin a good story with the truth.

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[–] marilynnewman 10 years ago

I thought about seeing this film, but on the History channel, they had a wartime documentary of the last flight of the Memphis Belle. Better a real one than a movie, surely. They showed all the tracking from the bomb bay door with a color camera. I've just recently seen another that was about the logistics of fighting over Germany (The Memphis Belle: A Story of a Flying Fortress 1944), the film's color unfortunately wasn't good, it also had no talking in the air, probably because the people had to use the masks, and couldn't be interfered with. Unfortunately, I can't find the other one I saw, I didn't write down the exact name, but it had to be the same day, surely, I saw the bombs dropping and exploding.

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[–] thedude47374 17 years ago

Unfortunately, for when this came out, this cliched style of cinema warfare was the norm. Very few movies were made with accuracy in mind until Saving Private Ryan, Black Hawk Down and Band of Brothers. You can hardly watch older war films without cliche and bad dialog. Even some of the classics suffer from this.

The real Memphis Belle had a humdrum final mission as the USAAF was desperate for her to complete her tour of duty because of their devastating losses. All this despite the fact that another crew, Hells Angels, had completed their tour without the watchful guidance of command. It was no coincidence that the Memphis Belle was in real life being played safe at the end of her tour, there was a three man camera crew aboard.

Standard procedure for a landing such as the one portrayed on film is to leave the wheel you have down. To suggest a belly landing instead, which the film actually did, would be a major mistake.

I discussed this a great deal with my colleagues and I feel I must say this here: Twelve O'clock High is indeed a great film, but the film is not about air combat, it is about command. Memphis Belle was the exact opposite. The closest you get to Twelve O'clock High is the seen with John Lithgow reading the letters.

They did fly in formation together. It's the scene where the Belle becomes lead plane. Not all five mind you, but there was reason for that. One had crashed on takeoff during filming and another shed a cowling and needed major engine repairs.

Years ago the Memphis Belle Association released an interesting newsletter that talked about why the movie came out the way it did. Apparently it was to be entitled "Southern Belle" and be about a non-descript plane on its final mission. The story line was altered by Warner Bros in an interesting attempt to make the film a bit more noticeable to the public. All the events shown in the film did happen, but not to the Belle...at least not all at once.

I'm sorry for the lengthy reply, Military Aviation History is kinda my thing, and my job.

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[–] boutetr 17 years ago

No need to apologize. A very informative post you did there. I've been a big fan of the B-17 since first reading about their legendary toughness and how much the crews loved them. I agree the movie had some annoyances but I enjoyed it very much for the most part. I had read prior to seeing it in the theaters that the movie was not an attempt to show the actual last mission of the Belle but to give an overall feel for what the aircrew's experienced at that time so I didn't find that contrivance to be an issue.

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[–] jklein-10 17 years ago

I watched a portion of this film the other day for the first time since its theatrical release and got a nice reminder of how much i disliked it. It's as though they took every corny cliche out of every badly made WW2 movie and inserted it as dialog for the script. there's not much to be said for the actor's delivery of these gems either.

the worst was the pilot wanting to get a visual on their target before releasing the bombs because he didn't want to hit the school right beside it. if only gravity guided bombs could be so precise. jeez the war had been over for 45 years by this point. sending 100's of bombers against a city is nasty business, no need to sugar-coat it anymore, we're not trying to rally the home front.

this one was painful to watch. there are certainly better examples from this general era of release, notably "A Bridge too Far" and "Das Boot" come to mind. the later being one of the best war films, IMO, ever.

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[–] demate-1 16 years ago

I was under the impression that the plane that explodes in the beginning does so because it's fuel tanks ignite.

Accept the ways of others, but respect first your own.

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[–] cornfed_bc 16 years ago

"The most dramatic line in the film "... it's only got one wheel down..." You idiot, pull the good one up and put it down in the grass! "

I believe they tried to do that and couldn't for whatever reason

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[–] james-2107 16 years ago

Given that 70% of B-17 crewmen became casualties and only 1 in 4 actually survived 25 missions, I think this film portrays an accurate sense of doom and dread.

If you have any empathy and emotion, you can connect with the idea of these guys having suvived their ordeal over Germany and they just need to land their broken ship.

I find that navigator screaming "We're not going to die, we're not going to die" to be a very moving scene as he winds down the wheel, simply because for so many young American airmen, they didn't make it back - and a number of those died when crash landing their stricken forts in England.

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[–] soruht 16 years ago

I wouldn't state it that strongly but yeah, the movie was pretty corny in places.

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[–] 16 years ago

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[–] TorontoJediMaster 16 years ago

I agree.

The film was cliched from start to finish.

As an earlier poster said, I can't believe how they got through 24 previous missions unscathed. There seems to be no real discipline in the air. The pilot feels a need to loudly order his crew around with the most basic of instructions (reminding the gunners to lead their targets, etc).

Plus, there were little discrepancies like how all the officers in the plane appeared to be wearing just thin leather jackets while the gunners all wore thick, sheepskin flying clothes -despite only a few feet of distance separating them.

Then, there are wildly implausible things like Danny, the radio operator, deciding to call up another B-17 in formation to have a chat with their radio operator. They're over enemy airspace! They were supposed to keep radio transmissions between aircraft to a minimum, and only about necessary things. What's more, the captain (i.e. the pilot of the aircraft) was the only one who could authorize transmitting to other planes.

And, the bit about the co-pilot desperate to get behind an gun so he could actually do something on a mission? If I had a co-pilot that immature, I'd want him off my plane ASAP. The co-pilot was a necessary position in that it gave two sets of eyes in the cockpit, as well as having someone there in case the pilot got hit. As well, I believe most co-pilots were eventually transferred to other planes as the pilot once they'd gotten some experience. That little stunt of letting an untrained man have a crack at the guns was negligent at best. Not only did it allow an untrained and inexperienced (thus innacurate) gunner behind the critical tail guns at a crucial time, but the seconds it took for them to switch positions meant that nobody was manning the guns right then.

And finally, there was David Strathairn as the CO who gives one of the most cliched speeces in war film history. He talks about how this is a mission that could deliver the blow to win the war, etc. THEN, he stays behind at the base. The standard practice was the Group Commander personally led the raid (or at least flew on it, as he would sometimes let other pilots lead to gain experience as the lead ship, in case of severe casualties later on). The crews didn't respect a CO who stayed on the ground. Good CO's led from their own cockpit.

Overall, this film was a highly disappointing collection of cliches from old war movies of the 1940's, 50's and 60's. I mean, Matthew Modine character orders the entire group to go around again because there was a school nearby? That's a noble gesture, to be sure. However, he's putting undue risk on his own crew AND all the other crew following to lower the risk to enemy civilians. This wasn't a mission over an occupied country, it was over the enemy heartland, and you didn't risk your planes or your own people any more than absolutely necessary. It was tragic, but that was the nature of air combat.

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[–] thedude47374 14 years ago

As I said in my earlier post, the film was admittedly cliche, but it wasn't as inaccurate as most would like to believe.

You mention the differences in uniforms. That was accurate. Crewmen in the nose and cockpit wore noticeably lighter clothing than the others aboard - their compartments weren't open to the air and were partially heated. I once interviewed a pilot from the 92BG, and he stated that his crew only had two electric jumpsuits, which were worn by the waist gunners since such equipment was in short supply. Flight equipment varied largely on individuality.

Group leaders flying on raids was the exception, not the norm. Most people bring up men like LeMay and Anderson but remember that they flew only from time to time. It was mainly a thing for morale. When they did fly, they rarely flew in the pilot's seat, usually opting for locations that would allow for greater freedom to watch the raid unfold. Their involvement was officially discouraged as good commanders were few and far between.

Incidents such as assignment changes for personal glory and breaches of radio silence did occur. While the film does make it look like a common occurrence, there were only a few instances of this sort of thing happening. There were times when too much thought wasn't given to inexperienced gunners: consider Earl Burke from Ken Burns's The War. He was made a ball turret gunner without actually being trained in its operation. The same goes for radio silence. There is a rather well known recording of a formation reacting wildly to seeing Me262s (jets) with the group leader coming on yelling for everyone to get off the air.

As for the infamous "We're going around again!" There were instances of this occurring. Yes, it is true that by-and-large bombardiers simply dropped their loads without a second thought. Do keep in mind that this was the earlier years of the offensive, a time where we were still out to prove that we were capable of hitting our targets (and we were a bit more idealistic). By the end of 1943, our bombers were loaded with GEE systems and mid-44, ground-reading radar systems were installed on special Pathfinder aircraft to mark the targets for the larger groups. These blind bombing systems lent to the "ah, to hell with it" attitude so prevalent in the latter years of the war.

I'm not saying that the film is perfect. Far from it. It's downright cheesy at parts. But it's not horrible, and it's not too bad at telling of the experience. It's probably the last movie we'll ever see using real airplanes to illustrate aerial combat - that in itself deserves respect.

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[–] 14 years ago

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[–] mjz688 14 years ago

Not sure what to make of that last tirade, but moving right along . . . I think thedude is right in stating that MB, while cliched and cheesy in places, is essentially accurate in many respects, contrary to the previous poster's contention. For instance, regarding radio silence, it was the rookie radio operator who broke radio silence, and Eric Stoltz's character chides him to stay off the air unless it's an emergency. Also, while it's true that on their 25th mission the captain might not be reminding the crew of every mundane detail (such as don't touch your guns with your bare hands because they'll freeze to the metal), I think a lot of that (accurate) dialog was added for the benefit of audience members who weren't familiar with the hazards of flying bombing missions over Germany in 1943. And I saw where another poster carped about the movie depicting escort fighters being used so early in the war. In fact, B-17 formations were escorted early in the war, but the fighters had to turn back well before they reached the targets in Germany because they didn't have the range (a circumstance that is actually depicted in the movie; unfortunately, they don't explain the reason why the fighters are turning back). The Germans knew about the range issue, and generally held back their fighters until the Allied escorts had to head for home. (Some high-ranking Nazi is said to have remarked that he knew the war was lost the first time he saw U.S. fighters escorting bombers over Berlin.) And it is true that the Americans believed their super-secret Norden bombsite could drop a bomb in a pickle barrel (the phrase, used in the movie, was actually how the site's supposed accuracy was described during the war). The reality, of course, turned out to be much different. Post-war surveys showed that high-altitude bombing, even in daylight, was highly inaccurate, and the Americans tacitly admitted as much late in the war when they joined the British in using "area bombing" tactics and practiced carpet bombing incendiary raids over Japan. (The part about making a second pass over the target to miss a school does seem overly romanticized, even for early in the war. I'd be interested if anyone can supply historical references about whether this sort of thing ever occurred, or if the second pass was made because the commander of the Memphis Belle wanted to hit the target because, as he says, it's their job and if they don't do it, another group of airmen will have to come back and do it.)

For anyone interested in knowing more about the subject, Martin Middlebrook wrote a series of books (still in print) mostly about the British bombing effort against Germany, but useful for a very detailed description of the tactics and equipment of the aerial campaign against the Third Reich. One book is devoted exclusively to the US's disastrous raids against Schweinfurt and Regensburg later in 1943, which essentially ended the practice of sending unescorted bombers to Germany in daylight until long-range escorts were available.

"Never get out of the boat." Absolutely goddamn right! Unless you were goin' all the way.

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[–] HungryWulf 14 years ago

"Also, while it's true that on their 25th mission the captain might not be reminding the crew of every mundane detail (such as don't touch your guns with your bare hands because they'll freeze to the metal), I think a lot of that (accurate) dialog was added for the benefit of audience members who weren't familiar with the hazards of flying bombing missions over Germany in 1943."

To add to this, it seemed that reminding the crew of the mundane was consistent with the pilot's character. He was a very "by-the-book" kind of officer, and this was even commented on by the co-pilot when they were going through the pre-flight checklist, something they've done many times (at least 24 times) before. The pilot telling the crew to "lead the targets; don't touch the guns without gloves on" reminded me of a father telling his kid to "drive safe" when borrowing the family car. It's not that he thinks that the kid was planning on driving unsafely, it's just something he says without really thinking about it.

Veni, Vidi, Vichy: I came, I saw, I surrendered to Germany

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[–] mcdemuth 8 years ago

This was just brought up in a more recent thread...

(I'm replying here, again, for those that won't read my responsed there...)

Dosen't anyone else here, but me, remember the scene where they were talking about what they were ALL going to do after the war?...

...and when the Captain got his turn, he says...

"Hey guys, think about this... My family owns a furnature business... You all can come to work for me..."

The Co-Pilot says to him... "That's the last thing we need, you ordering us around for the rest of our lives."

Then EVERYONE, starts shouting all those "REMINDERS", that the Captain said earlier in the film... Back at the Captain...

Then the Captain said: "I'm not that bad..."

Basically, this was like a joke that had to be setup for it to work. Without out all those "REMINDERS" said throughout the earlier part of the film that "annoyed" so many viewers, everyone here would be complaining that they didn't understand why they were saying all those things to him later on... and would now be constantly asking what that was about...

I GOT THE JOKE, and I THOUGHT IT WAS RATHER HUMOUROUS...

Even the part with the Co-Pilot getting ANNOYED with his Captain for wanting to Double Check everything while the rest of the crew got out the plane, while waiting for the cloud cover over the target to clear, so they could take off for the mission.

But I guess they should have just left that all of that out of the film... since so few viewers got the joke...

...or as for some yet undiscovered reasons as to why no one else here is including that in their responses about why the Captain kept saying all those "REMINDERS".

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[–] Movie25 12 years ago

I completely disagree ...

I watched Memphis Belle again recently and still believe this production is very underated.

The production has a sound storyline, boasts a great cast and captured the various emotions and moods throughout

In addition, the main theme was perfectly suited

Movie Rating : 8 / 10

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[–] imaregularjoe 10 years ago

I completely disagree ... I watched Memphis Belle again recently and still believe this production is very underated.

The production has a sound storyline, boasts a great cast and captured the various emotions and moods throughout

In addition, the main theme was perfectly suited

Keep your day job and give up your dream of being a movie critic. The movie sucked horribly.

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[–] spookyrat1 10 years ago

The movie sucked horribly.

Profound!

Interesting thread! There are a number of alleged experts all competing to convince ordinary punters like myself of the accuracy of their comments: E.G. Belly landings were the right/wrong thing to do. The captain would/wouldn't say such things. The crew would/wouldn't wear such things. The Group Commander would/wouldn't fly. etc.

For my money a good, fictionalized depiction of a young bomber crew operating well as a team, under highly stressful, war-time conditions.

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