Lucybespro It is a performances centric movie

Steineded How sad is this?

SteinMo What a freaking movie. So many twists and turns. Absolutely intense from start to finish.

Dynamixor The performances transcend the film's tropes, grounding it in characters that feel more complete than this subgenre often produces.

MartinHafer "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo" is one of the best movies made during the war years. While the typical war film made during WWII avoided realism in favor of jingoism and propaganda, this one excels because it tried to get the facts right and plays almost like a documentary merged with a typical Hollywood drama. When you read about the efforts that MGM went to make the film, you realize it was a real labor of love and the movie holds up remarkably well today. This film is about the famous Doolittle Raid on Japan which occurred in 1942. While the actual physical impact of the bombing raid was not especially great, it was a bit public relations victory-- bolstering American morale and reducing the Japanese sense of invulnerability which had been prevalent. The movie begins shortly before the men were recruited for the raid and follows them through training, the actual raid and the fate of a bomber crew. Incidentally, all the planes were lost in the raid...it was intended as a one-way mission.What makes the film strong is not just the emphasis on realism but the acting and direction. Van Johnson was sort of an 'everyman' for the audience to love and root for...and MGM did a great job ladling on the sentimentality but not laying it on too thick. Having supporting actors like Spencer Tracy, Robert Walker and Robert Mitchum sure didn't hurt, either! All in all, a great film and an excellent tribute to these crazy but very brave men who did what their country asked. As for the best scene in the movie, it's a little one with no dialog...as you see a Chinese woman crying silently as some of the injured Americans are being taken to safety. Stunning.By the way, an excellent but over-the-top film about crew captured by the Japanese following the Doolittle Raid is also portrayed in Twentieth Century Fox's "The Purple Heart". It's an excellent film but occasionally lapses into propaganda mode a few times too often to be taken as seriously as "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo".

Neil Doyle THIRTY SECONDS OVER TOKYO has men training for a dangerous mission, led by Col. Doolittle (Spencer Tracy) who leads them into an adventure that begins with fully loaded bombers making their ascent into the wild blue yonder aboard Naval aircraft carriers. The cooperative team efforts between the Navy and the Air Force is demonstrated throughout and the result is a film that looks almost documentary in its approach to the subject matter.But you have to get beyond some sentimental interludes for romance and that's where the story weakens somewhat, despite the sincerity of the moments depicted between VAN JOHNSON (as Lt. Dawson) and his loving wife (PHYLLIS THAXTER). Nevertheless, by the time the story reaches its powerful conclusion, you'll be rooting for the reunion of the husband (a wounded war hero who has lost one leg) and his wife who is expecting a baby.Sterling performances help put the movie over. Never for a moment is the acting less than exceptional--and that includes VAN JOHNSON in the leading role, ably supported by SPENCER TRACY, ROBERT WALKER, ROBERT MITCHUM, DON DeFORE, SCOTT McKAY, STEPHEN McNALLY (billed as Horace McNally) and, in an unbilled small role, BILL WILLIAMS. All give natural portrayals that are as compelling as the events of the bombing over Tokyo, the crash landing in China and the many events that follow. Relationships between Americans and the Chinese make for the most touching elements in the crash scene and the hospitalization.A fine tribute to the war effort, it's among the best of the service films produced by any of the major studios during WWII.

MHeying777-1 I was born in July, 1945, and viewed the film in 2009 as research for my memoir about growing up in a Texas orphanage. I was searching for clues about my mother's life, the era into which I was born. She would likely have viewed the film. I was struck by a line spoken by Ted's young wife Ellen and repeated in his mind at key emotional moments of the film.Ellen says (in effect), "This baby is what tells me you will come back to me." In the mind of an insecure young woman in a rocky marriage (as my mother was), the powerfully delivered message seemed to say: get pregnant to keep your man. It didn't work out that way. Right after my father left for duty in Germany, she divorced him. I was eight months old.I read the book when I was ten and enjoyed it immensely. I liked how the film portrayed wartime American culture, though I'm sure it was idealized for the propaganda effect.The buffoonery about singing "The Eyes of Texas" was painful because the abuse at the Texas orphanage was horrific.It's ironic that I live in Alameda, where the Hornet is a tourist attraction as a museum.

The_Cinephile Hello, dear mid-'40s, Hollywood-style, low-budget, war films fans EVERYWHERE!!! :PI was just wondering where could I find this one's script 'coz I can't find it anywhere, it seems(!) :( I need it for a subtitling job, BADLY(!) As for the film itself, I believe it's awful, as all the other war(-time) ones, made by the Americans FOR the Americans and their kitsch patriotic spirit. :) Furthermore, even though this may "sound" offensive to some, it's MY pov and I have my FULL rights to it; freedom of expression. :) Now, WHY is it awful, imao? Well, because it depicts those very funny made characters, talking like a machinegun, the Japanese soldiers who don't know anything else BUT beheading pows, and last but not least, those very energetic women-of-arms who act more than boyish. They remind me of Lt. Yarrrr. :))~ S.M. ~