Review
This is a very propagandistic type of movie. One B-17 flies from the U.S. to Pearl Harbor, which has just been attacked; they move on to Wake, which has just been attacked; they move to Manila, which has just been attacked, and plan to fly to Australia, which is coming under attack.
There are several references to “fifth column” people on Hawaii, and the film makes no apologies to slurs on the Japanese Americans located on Hawaii.
The film, other than the slurs, is fairly decent, although, at the end, it suddenly takes an enormous jump of time and distance which doesn't make a whole lot of sense.
I guess it's a typical film for the time when it was made.
Synopsis
A group of pilots are going to ferry some B-17s, and attention is on one plane, the Mary-Ann. It gets a new radio man and a new gunner. The radioman is a gun-ho new guy, and the gunner is a cynical person with a very nasty attitude.
The gunner had failed air flight school.
The planes are the ones that were sent to Pearl Harbor and arrived just as the attack was getting underway. Unfortunately, the planes have no ammunition on them. On the way there they pick up radio transmissions from the Japanese who were bombing the base.
The planes disperse and land at alternate landing strips.
In an attack on persons of Japanese ancestry that were living in Hawaii, two of the men claim to have been shot at by “Local Japs, nice friendly fellows.”
The men from the plane have been fixing a landing gear and suddenly they all come under fire, so they take off.
Then in the movie one of the guys at the field says that three vegetable trucks smashed the tales of planes on the airfield, implying that local Japanese were the ones who did it.
Another reference is made when a different guy says he was driving a car when a produce truck pulled in front of him, blocking the road, and a Japanese driver shot at him.
The plane is ordered to fly to Manila with a stopover at Wake Island. In flight, the men listen to FDR's request to Congress for a state of war against Japan.
They land at Wake just after it had been attacked. While at the base, there's a reference made to “a lot of fifth column work” at Hickam Field.
The guys are told they have to leave within twenty minutes, and are expected to fly on to Manila.
They land at Clark Field shortly after it had been attacked by the Japanese. They take off again fairly soon but the plane gets shot down and the crew has to abandon it. One guy manages to land the plane. It's due to be destroyed as wreckage, but the crew fixes it up.
They head for Australia. The plane just happens to run across a Japanese invasion fleet and radios for help. Of course, the American group manages to decimate the Japanese invasion force.
Suddenly, the scene is only about 900 miles from Tokyo, and the pilots are going to lead a bombing mission against Tokyo.
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