Thanks for the memories!

One of my all time favorites.

Good , But It Is Overrated By Some

This movie tries so hard to be funny, yet it falls flat every time. Just another example of recycled ideas repackaged with women in an attempt to appeal to a certain audience.

This is a History Channel program depicting various aerial battles. The time era takes place from the first generation bi-planes to modern aviators during Desert Storm. The Phil Crowley narrations give the program a steady newsreel sensibilities. There are military experts, historians, and sometimes, actual participants in those battles. It has old footage, maps, and most importantly CGI recreations of the aerial combat. The CGI is good for TV of that time period. It is excellent at presenting the combat tactics of these pilots. The show gives the general specifications of these planes and describe their strength and weaknesses. The CGI is able to inject action into the documentary programs. This is a must for aerial combat enthusiasts of any era.

Just started watching the documentary "Dogfights" and the first one I saw was about the Thunderbolt against the FW-190. I must say that I have to agree with the majority of the other reviews that based on the one program I have seen it is totally biased towards the American pilots and planes. The Americans who did take part in the war certainly sacrificed a lot and deserve all the praise they get. It's unfortunately some of the so called historians and documentaries that put it all out of whack with their inability to see beyond their nose. Besides that I have never understood why some film companies have to scale down the picture size when recounting something in the past. In this documentary the actual black and white pictures were framed by some sort of background. It does nothing to enhance the viewing experience and is a bit of an irritation. The worst part of the program and which was a real disappointed was the pilot who tried to describe the dogfight while flying. The noise of the engine just made the whole thing worse. Well this is one series that I am not going to watch.

Although the series is high in technical proficiency and detail to re-animate air battles, there is an almost complete of historical balance. The focus of most chapters is on American aviators as if they were repeating the "Mariana's turkey shot" through the ages. Only a few chapters are devoted to Israeli or German and Japanese odds-and-ends (Me-163, kamikaze, etc.). Almost no mention is done of German, Russian, Japanese, Chinese and even North Vietnamese Aces that top all-time aerial combat Aces lists. They even neglect traditional allies as the British and the French. There are very detailed accounts of aerial battles from the "other guys" point of view that should be included to have a really "Historical balance" of aerial warfare.

I just watched the entire first season on DVD. This series is excellent for putting you "in the cockpit" to see how some specific dogfights unfolded. You are shown the tactical situations, the options available, the merits of each option, and what was actually tried. The specific dogfights span from Rickenbacker in the First World War to some modern jet dogfights. The commentaries by the pilots and eminent historians are excellent.There are some minor weaknesses. The first is that some viewers might be put off by the heavy emphasis on American pilots. If you are looking for American exploits, you will like these episodes. The second is that there are many small technical errors. For example, when talking about the P-40, they once show some P-51A fighters, which are entirely different aircraft. They describe the German MK 108 cannon as the "Mark 108" cannon, although MK does not stand for "Mark" in that case (a common error). The graphic for the SB2C Helldiver shows it with a six-blade propeller. They refer to "laser-guided" air-to-air missiles when they actually mean "radar-guided". The videos are still wonderful, but some viewers might be annoyed as I was by the many minor errors.