Not Much History Here

  A Flying Circus

Flying Tigers
(1942) – A highly fictionalized story about the American Volunteer
group in the days leading up to U.S. involvement in WWII. A group of
American pilots fly out of Chinese airfields to battle Japanese
forces in the air. Add in a romantic triangle sub-plot, and you get a
classic piece of wartime propaganda for the folks at home.

Directed by David Miller

Starring John Wayne, John Carroll, Anna Lee

Why I Liked It – Ignore the bad history, and enjoy the aerial battle scenes.

So,
here’s another of my weekend movie on television from my childhood.
John Wayne was still big business for me when I hit the floor in the
living room. He was big, and he was tough, and he usually showed a
pretty good sense of humor, too. As I’ve grown older and my worldview
has become a bit more sophisticated (I hope), movies like this show some
fraying around the ideological/historical edges. At the same, there’s
still the “boy’s adventure” aspect of the story that still had some
appeal half a century plus later.

There was a group called the
American Volunteer Group (AVG) that flew Curtiss P-40 fighters, and some
of them (AVG-1) were known as the “Flying Tigers”. The P-40 was a
favorite American fighter of the period for me, and with the cool shark
mouth decoration, they were just cool to see. Beyond that?

Well, there’s a lot more Hollywood here than history.

The
Flying Tigers did not fight prior to the U.S. entry into World War II
in December 1941. They weren’t a ragtag group of freelance pilots. In
fact, the U.S. government created and supported the AVG, with its pilots
drawn from active or reserve duty ranks. There’s plenty to admire in
the actual history, but you find little of it here.

John Wayne
plays his standard “tough but fair” beloved leader role here, while John
Carroll is the lovable rogue who doesn’t follow the rules. Anna Lee is a
largely forgettable, standard issue pretty girl caught between two big
strong men. There is nothing, and I mean NOTHING, to surprise you in the
plot. “Pappy” (Wayne) and “Woody” (Carroll) bump heads at increasing
velocities over the girl, the rules, airfield discipline, you name it.
It all comes to a head with the death of another member of the unit, and
there’s a heroic sacrifice made at the end. At the very end (no, this
isn’t much if any of a spoiler) they hand a recruit a silk aviator’s
scarf with the words “Take good care of that. It belonged to a pretty
good flyer”. Back in the day, that was good for a little twinge of the
heart and maybe a sniffle.

Like a lot of movies of the time,
“Flying Tigers” was designed to get the American public fired up about
the inevitable entry into the war. The filmmakers were still producing
the movie when Japan bombed Pearl Harbor (watch for the nod to that that
was added). It was just what the country needed/wanted at the moment – a
flag-waving, positive movie. For the modern viewer, at least of that is
going to be uncomfortable, but the action sequences are pretty amazing.
All the aerial combat was shot with either professional pilots doing
the stunt flying or miniatures.

Call it a classic case of “It is
what it is”. I have a special fondness for the movie because of the
Saturday tv matinee connection, plus the scene with the depth perception
test for the pilots. My depth perception is pretty bad, so I’ve always
wondered if I could pass the test.

“Flying Tigers” is available
for sale at the usual outlets. You can also rent/stream the movie at
Microsoft Store, Apple TV, Amazon Video, Google Play Movies, YouTube,
and Vuduonline.

Rating – *** Worth A Look