Too many fans seem to be blown away

A Disappointing Continuation

A lot of perfectly good film show their cards early, establish a unique premise and let the audience explore a topic at a leisurely pace, without much in terms of surprise. this film is not one of those films.

It is an exhilarating, distressing, funny and profound film, with one of the more memorable film scores in years,

"Wing and a Prayer" is one of the Hollywood films made about WW II during the war. It was unusual in that it was the first time the U.S. Navy allowed a civilian film crew to shoot aboard a vessel during wartime. Most of the good action stuff we see in war movies was shot by military cameramen and crews. The shipboard filming for the movie was done during the shakedown cruise of the new USS Yorktown carrier out of San Diego. It had been launched Jan. 21, 1943, at Newport News, VA, and was commissioned in April of that year. This was after the former Yorktown had been sunk on June 7, 1942, in the Battle of Midway.The best thing about this film to me is that it shows some of the work that the carrier crews had to do – not just the more thrilling jobs of the Navy pilots. And, it shows some of the insides and routine of the pilots as they prepare for missions. I enjoy this because I served in the Army during the Cold War years leading up to Vietnam, and I appreciate seeing and learning what service in the other branches was like. The studio mixed some real action film into the picture. This was stuff shot during the Battle of Coral Sea and the Battle of Midway. However, it's not nearly as impressive as the use of actual combat footage in later films about the war.The plot moves along rather slowly, and it follows an unnamed carrier, "Carrier X," on a fictitious mission in the South Pacific to fool the Japanese into thinking the U.S. fleet was scattered around the Pacific. That was so that Japan would be tricked into attacking Midway on the way to its final conquest of Hawaii. In reality, the U.S. had broken the Japanese code and knew that Japan planned attack at Midway and then go on to Hawaii.The acting in this film is so-so, with no standouts. I agree with another reviewer who found it a strange casting decision to have British actor Cedric Hardwicke play the unnamed admiral in this film. The character most likely was supposed to be the Chief of Naval Operations at the time whose manner and language was anything but like the proper, well-mannered English of Sir Hardwicke. Otherwise, the film is OK.The Yorktown was not one of the three American carriers in the Pacific when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941. It had been in the Pacific after it was commission in 1937, but was moved to the Atlantic through the Panama Canal at the outbreak of WWII in Europe. She was in Norfolk, VA when Pearl Harbor was bombed, but she then sailed for San Diego and arrived there Dec. 30, 1941.The Battle of Coral Sea took place May 4-8, 1942, and the Battle of Midway was June 3-7, 1942. The new Yorktown (CV-10) joined the Pacific Fleet by mid-1943 for the duration of the war. It was decommission in 1975 and is now a museum ship and national historic landmark at Patriot's Point in South Carolina. On May 19, 1998, marine explorer Dr. Robert Ballard led a National Geographic research team that discovered the wreck of the Yorktown. It was more than three miles down on the ocean floor."Wing and a Prayer" was released in America after its July 28, 1944, premier in Providence RI. The 1970 movie, "Tora! Tora! Tora!" is a much more accurate, detailed and historic account of the Battle of Midway. It is done with excellent portrayals of the Japanese as well as American forces and units.

A great cast can't help this film and basically here is why:The goal of the navy was to fool the Japanese by thinking that we weren't strong enough to fight back and therefore we would run away from any fight. This is supposed to end when we get enough strength to fight full force at Midway.As a result, this becomes too much of a talky film with everyone basically complaining-where is the navy? How much can you really concentrate on basically doing nothing?Perhaps, if there had been an element of women in the film at the war front, the film might have been better.The always gruff Charles Bickford has little to work with here. Instead, some of his lines go to Don Ameche, but even he can be tolerated up until a certain point. Dana Andrews is missing real grit here. William Eythe, who was so good in 1947's "The House on 92nd Street," also has little to work with.This is a major disappointment.

The movie is very interesting, and according to my own researches and familiarities ( since I am presently in my eighth decade ), one of the pleasures for me was NOT to see the time-worn scene of the bullet-riddled F4F "crashing" onto the deck and sliding into the command tower, as is shown in 9 out of 8 movies about WWII Navy pictures. Don Ameche does, if fact, do a very "military" version of the man-in-charge. Me Dear-departed mither into her ninth decade felt that Dana Andrews was the true Hollywoodie-Hero of all times. But what intrigues me MOST about the movie, since we have cruised through the islands of the tropical Pacific ( Figi, Samoa, American Samoa ), is that the film makers felt it necessary for the pilots, when retiring at night aboard ship, to wear PAJAMAS, and sleep under SHEETS and BLANKETS. WE did no such thing !!!

Picked this up as a cheap DVD recently.Part (small) documentary, part film, part propaganda. Various readers have commented on the accuracy of the aircraft etc, but as WW2 was still going on when this was filmed I guess they made use of what was available.Follows a familiar theme of other WW2 films made whilst the war was in progress - Wake Island, Air Force etc in that historical accuracy is sometimes lacking, but as a flag-waver at the time it probably had the desired effect.Although born some time after WW2 ended, as a story of life aboard a carrier it looked quite realistic to me. It was only the battle scenes where it seemed to lose its way, but this was nothing to do with the quality of special effects. Probably a bit too jingoistic.Some good performances, particularly Don Ameche. It stands the test of time well, and a film that should not be forgotten and that I will certainly watch several times more.