Midway

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Midway 1976.jpg

Starring (see article)
Directed by Jack Smight
Produced by Walter Mirisch
Music by John Williams
Cinematography Harry Stradling Jr.
Runtime 131 mins
IMDB Info 0074899 on IMDb

Midway, released in the United Kingdom as Battle of Midway, is a 1976 American Technicolor war film that chronicles the Battle of Midway, a turning point in World War II in the Pacific, directed by Jack Smight and produced by Walter Mirisch from a screenplay by Donald S. Sanford. The film features an international cast of stars including Charlton Heston, Henry Fonda, James Coburn, Glenn Ford, Ed Nelson, Hal Holbrook, Toshiro Mifune, Robert Mitchum, Cliff Robertson, Robert Wagner, James Shigeta, Pat Morita, John Fujioka, Robert Ito and Christina Kokubo.

The music score by John Williams and the cinematography by Harry Stradling Jr. were both highly regarded. The soundtrack used Sensurround to augment the physical sensation of engine noise, explosions, crashes and gunfire. Despite mixed reviews, Midway became the tenth most popular movie at the box office in 1976.

Plot

The film follows two threads; one centered on the Japanese chief strategist Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, and the other on naval aviators Captain Matt Garth and his son, Ensign Thomas Garth.

After the Doolittle Raid and the Battle of the Coral Sea in 1942, The Imperial Japanese Navy has been undefeated and outnumbers the American naval forces by four to one. The Japanese began the planning for the Battle of Midway, creating a complicated battle plan. Unknown to the Japanese, American signals intelligence has broken the Japanese Naval encryption codes and suspects that the ambush will take place at Midway Island. They then trick the Japanese into confirming it. Senior officer Matt Garth is involved in various phases of the US planning and execution of the battle, while pilot Thomas Garth is romantically involved with Haruko Sakura, an American-born daughter of Japanese immigrants, who has been interned with her parents. Captain Garth calls in all of his favors with a long-time friend to investigate the charges against the Sakuras. American Admiral Chester Nimitz plays a desperate gamble by sending his last remaining aircraft carriers to Midway before the Japanese to set up his own ambush. The gamble pays off and all four of the Japanese carriers are destroyed in the battle of Midway. Captain Garth himself is killed at the end of the battle when his plane crashes, while the injured younger Garth is carried off the ship, seen by a free Haruko at the dockside, indicating Captain Garth had some success in investigating the charges against the Sakuras.

Successful in saving Midway, but at a heavy cost, Nimitz reflects that Yamamoto "had everything going for him", asking "were we better than the Japanese, or just luckier?"

Production

Filming

Midway was shot at the Terminal Island Naval Base, Los Angeles, California, the U.S. Naval Station, Long Beach, California, and Naval Air Station Pensacola, Florida. The on-board scenes were filmed in the Gulf of Mexico aboard USS Lexington. Lexington, an Essex-class aircraft carrier, was the last World War II-era carrier left in service at that point (1976), although the ship was completed after the battle. She is now a museum ship at Corpus Christi, Texas.

Scenes depicting Midway Island were filmed at Point Mugu, California. "Point Mugu has sand dunes, just like Midway. We built an airstrip, a tower, some barricades, things like that," said Jack Smight. "We did a lot of strafing and bombing there.

A Consolidated PBY-6A Catalina BuNo 63998, N16KL, of the Commemorative Air Force, was used in depicting all the search and rescue mission scenes.

Sound

The film was the second of only four films released with a Sensurround sound mix which required special speakers to be installed in movie theatres. The other Sensurround films were Earthquake (1974), Rollercoaster (1977), and Battlestar Galactica (1978). The regular soundtrack (dialog, background and music) was monaural; a second optical track was devoted to low frequency rumble added to battle scenes and when characters were near unmuffled military engines.

Action

Many of the action sequences used footage from earlier films: most sequences of the Japanese air raids on Midway are stock shots from 20th Century Fox's "Tora! Tora! Tora!" (1970). Some scenes are from the Japanese Toho film "Hawai Middouei daikaikusen: Taiheiyo no arashi" (1960) (which also stars Mifune). Several action scenes, including the one where a Mitsubishi A6M Zero slams into Yorktown's bridge, were taken from "Away All Boats" (1956); scenes of Doolittle's Tokyo raid at the beginning of the film are from "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo" (1944). In addition, most dogfight sequences come from wartime gun camera footage or from the film "Battle of Britain" (1969).

Cast member Henry Fonda (Admiral Nimitz) had been one of the narrators of the 1942 John Ford documentary "The Battle of Midway", some footage from which was used in the 1976 film. This was the third film dealing with the aftermath of Pearl Harbor with which Henry Fonda had been involved. Henry first narrated the 1942 film "The Battle of Midway" and starred in the 1965 film "In Harm's Way". The only actress with a speaking part in the original film was Christina Kobuko as Horuko. In the TV version of the film Susan Sullivan appears playing Matt Garth's girlfriend. Later video versions dropped Sullivan to emphasize the essentially all-male cast and wartime action.

Japanese carrier hit by US bombs (for this scene, Midway editors used stock footage from the Japanese movie "Storm Over the Pacific" (太平洋の嵐 Taiheiyo no arashi), 1960).

As with many "carrier films" produced around this time, the US Navy Essex-class aircraft carriers USS Lexington and USS Boxer played the parts of both American and Japanese flattops for shipboard scenes.


Box Office Reception

Midway proved extremely popular with movie audiences, earning over $43 million at the box office, becoming the tenth most popular movie of 1976.

Historical accuracy

The plot follows the real battle remarkably well. Even though simplified, omitting details here and there did not distort the story. Such details, among others, were reduced:

  • More flag officers took part at the decision making and planning before the battle, not just Nimitz, Fletcher and Spruance. All the same, commanding officers' staffs were generally bigger than the one or two men portrayed in the movie.
  • A dmiral King, commander-in-chief of the navy at that time, approved the Midway battle plan propounded by Nimitz. They were regularly in contact, so there was no need of sending fictional Capt. Vinton Maddox to consult Nimitz (apart from enabling James Coburn to star in the movie).
  • There were numerous air attacks by Midway-based bombers on approaching Japanese fleets completely omitted in the script. However, these had the same effect as later carrier-based torpedo bombers decimated by Japanese fleet air defenses portrayed in the movie. Lack of impact from initial raids by land-based bombers only convinced Japanese commanders of their invincibility and incompetency of US military.
  • The film omits that the Japanese destroyer Arashi that inadvertently guided US attack planes to Nagumo's carriers had unsuccessfully depth-charged U.S. submarine Nautilus, which had unsuccessfully attacked the battleship Kirishima.
  • During the American torpedo attacks, Admiral Chūichi Nagumo and his subordinates are shaken by the American pilots' unexpected bravery. Nagumo remarks "They sacrifice themselves like samurai, these Americans". Similar to Isoroku Yamamoto's sleeping giant quote from the 1970 film "Tora! Tora! Tora!", there is no evidence that Nagumo made this statement. When the Akagi is bombed, Nagumo is stunned by the force of the bomb's blast and is unable to get up, being tended to by Genda. A subordinate quietly asks, "Admiral, you must transfer your flag. The cruiser Nagara is close by." Nagumo, in a weak voice, says "Advise Admiral Yamaguchi". In real life, Nagumo would have certainly experienced hard knocks while being tossed about the carrier as the explosions went off around him. The buffeting he encountered during the bombing, as well as the loss of two of his carriers would have left him in no condition to exert even his remaining confidence in victory. However, Nagumo was certainly not stunned by the blast, and unable to get up. Witnesses saw Nagumo standing near the ship’s compass looking out at the flames on his flagship and two other carriers in a state of shock. Additionally, despite being asked to transfer his flag, Nagumo initially didn’t move and was reluctant to leave the Akagi, just muttering, “It's not time yet,”. Nagumo's chief of staff, Rear Admiral Ryūnosuke Kusaka, was able to persuade him to leave the critically damaged Akagi. Nagumo, with a barely perceptible nod, with tears in his eyes, agreed to go.
  • Later studies by Japanese and American military historians call into question key scenes, like the dive-bombing attack that crippled the first three Japanese carriers. In the movie, American pilots report, "They've got bombs stacked all over their flight deck! We caught 'em flat-footed! No fighter cover; decks loaded with bombs!" As Jonathan Parshall and Anthony Tully write in "Shattered Sword" (2005), aerial photography from the battle showed nearly empty decks. In addition, Japanese carriers loaded armament onto planes below the flight deck, unlike American carriers (as depicted earlier in the film). The fact that a closed hangar full of armaments was hit by bombs made damage to Akagi more devastating than if planes, torpedoes and bombs were on an open deck. During the attack on the Japanese carriers, an American pilot reports, "Scratch one flat top!" This is a famous radio transmission but it was made one month earlier during the Battle of the Coral Sea by Lieutenant Commander Robert E. Dixon after his dive bomber squadron sunk the Japanese aircraft carrier Shōhō.
  • While most characters portray real persons, some of them are fictional though inspired by actual people. Captain Matt Garth and his son, Ensign Thomas Garth, are both fictional characters. Captain Matthew Garth's contribution to planning the battle is based rather faithfully on actual work of Lieutenant-Commander Edwin Layton. Layton served as Pacific fleet intelligence officer. He spoke Japanese and was key to transposing raw outputs of cryptography analysis into meaningful intelligence for Nimitz and his staff. Layton was long-time friend of Joseph Rochefort. Matt Garth's further exploits were pure fiction and resembled deeds of at least two more persons. First, an intelligence officer at Adm. Fletcher's Task Force 17 staff and then the leader of the last attack made by dive bombers from USS Yorktown. The latter, however, was actually performed by VB-3 dive bomber squadron led by LCDR Maxwell Leslie. Matt Garth's character thus combines three actual people involved in the battle. While this is reasonable for the sake of storytelling, it could not have happened as it was unimaginable to put such a valuable officer as fleet intelligence officer in harm's way. Besides, Layton was not a flyer.

Historical footage and atelier shots of warplanes' actions are mostly inaccurate in the movie. Most of the original footage portrays later and/or different events and thus planes and ships that were not operational during the battle or did not take part. Among the first aircraft shown taking off to defend Midway are two Army P-40 Warhawks. There were no P-40s stationed at Midway, only Marine F4F Wildcats and F2A-3 Buffalos. In the second air attack on Yorktown, the movie shows two Japanese planes hitting the aircraft carrier. There were no plane crashes into ships in this battle. One of the most flagrant moments is Matt Garth's collision at the very end of the movie, which is followed by the recording of a post-war jet plane crash that actually occurred on USS Midway. Like the USS Lexington used in filming, USS Midway is also preserved as a museum.

Review from imdb.com website:
by LeroyBrown-219

A good movie about how grand battles are won and lost LeroyBrown-219 October 2007 I remember reading that this movie was made primarily because they had excessive footage from when they shot "Tora! Tora! Tora! and some of the shot looks like they did came from that film. But this film also includes old actual shots taken by service men and news people.

The movie is based on the American victory off Midway Island. The movie was made 30 years after WWII and a couple of years after Vietnam, so it doesn't have a jingoistic feel to it. It has more of a matter of fact feel to it, more a docudrama than propaganda.

The movie is different from most war movies because it shows how Grand battles are won and lost. There isn't much individual heroism from ordinary soldiers shown. Instead, we see how commanders, in this case, admirals make decisions and take risks usually based on sketchy information. They put their reputations on the line, along with the safety of their men, and the security of their nations. We see how the outcome of a battle hinges on risky decisions or sometimes on indecision. We see how commanders have to sweat out their decisions as History hangs in the balance. Yes! History! This battle after all is considered the turning point of the War in the Pacific.

In this movie, decisions are made on what certain letters mean, whether enemy carriers are where they are supposed to be. If viewers give it the appropriate attention, they will see that this movie plays like a giant chess match. The outcome is determined by gutsy moves and bad decisions, sometimes indecision.

The movie boasts an impressive cast which includes, Henry Fonda, Glenn Ford, Robert Mitchum, Cliff Robertson, Charlton Heston and they all do fine jobs. They play the typical Grand characters in epic movies, they move the story along but has no personal stories themselves. The one personal story belongs to Edward Albert, who plays Heston's son. He's not very convincing and playing opposite a pro like Mr. Heston, he comes across as being weak almost amateurish.

The movie is good but far from great. I love how the filmmakers remained true to the events. But the special effects looked cheap and the use of actual combat footage feels inappropriate and even exploitive. Nevertheless, I think it's a good film not to be missed by Military History buffs.


See also Movies with Impact

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