Air Force (Warner Bros.) (1943)

FEATURE PAGE ITEMS ABOUT THE PICTURE AND ITS PLAYERS eee Hollywood, Too, Speeds Up Its Production Defense plants aren’t the only industries speeding up production. Hollywood, too, is doubling up on its hours and efforts to help the cause of ultimate victory. One company, Warner Bros.’ “Air Force,” starring John Garfield, Gig Young, Harry Carey, and George Tobias, carried through its production program under circumstances which would try the hardiest soul. The large troupe of more than 200 crew and cast worked on location in Tampa, Fla., where the heat has broken a _ 20-year record. In spite of what he calls the most difficult conditions of his long career in motion pictures, Director Howard Hawks has ordered his cast and crew to be on the job from dawn to dark every day in the week in order that “Air Force” may reach the public as soon as possible. Drawn from heretofore secret government files, the story of “Air Force” is the story of our gallant fiyers in the South Pacific from the moment hostilities broke out on December 7th, 1941. A Hal B. Wallis production, “Air Force” has been made with the full cooperation of the U.S. Air Corps through arrangement with Gen H. H. Arnold, chief of the corps. Two officers from his office, Majors Sam Triffy and Jack Coulter, are acting as technical directors with the film company. ‘Air Foree’ Actor in Merchant Marine Ray Montgomery, young actor who plays the role of the “Kid,” second radio man and bottom turret gunner of the Flying Fortress, the “Mary Ann,” in the Warner Bros. picture, “Air Force,’ now at the Strand Theatre, has submitted applications for his two dogs to the army’s “dogs for defense” branch of the nation’s service. Montgomery has a collie and a shepherd dog, named Monday and Tuesday. Both are young males, he says, still untrained and of the type wanted by the army for war training. Ray, himself, is now serving with the Naval Reserve Merchant Marine. He enlisted in that branch of the service following the completion of his role in “Air Force.” Air Force Heroes Still AF 57*; Mat 204—30c John Garfield and Gig Young enact history in Warner Bros.’ saga of the war in the Pacific, “Air Force,’? whose story is taken from the files of the United States Air Corps. The picture opens Friday at the Strand Theatre. > War Air Fields Reproduced for Film Five widely separated airports were faithfully reproduced in Florida for Warner Bros.’ “Air Force,” coming to the Strand Theatre on Friday. Representing fields in this country to the most far-flung outposts in the South Pacific, the pro duction airports were exact duplicates of Mather Field, Sacramento; Hickam in Honolulu; Wake on Wake Island; Clark Feld in Manila and an improvised field in the jungle. “Air Force” charts the progress of “Mary Ann,” a Flying Fortress, from one field to another. Based on fact, the journey shows the B-17 in various stages of embattlement, including a re-creation of Colin Kelly’s sensational sinking of the Japanese warship, “Haruna” and the engagements of the Coral Sea, Midway and Guam. Ten weeks of shooting at locations in and around Tampa, Fla., were necessary to record the air battle scenes. Two officers from the staff of General H. H. “Hap” Arnold, chief of the Air Corps, Major Sam Triffy and Major Jack Coulter, super vised the filming. Still AF 62*; Mat 203—30c The ‘Mary Ann’ Talks Back With John Garfield behind the trigger the “Mary Ann,” Boeing Flying Fortress heroine of Warner Bros.’ film, “Air Force,” answers the attack of Jap Zero planes. The picture is now playing at the Strand Theatre. 24. Coral Sea Battle Re-fought in Film They re-fought the Coral Sea battle for “Air Force,” Warner Eros.’ picture about our air activities in the Pacific war area. On the sidelines could be seen a giant bomber’s nose as it approached a Jap battleship. The bomber was the “Mary Ann,” the Boeing B-17 heroine of “Air Force,” the story of its exploits in various engagements in the Pacific area. The picture is now at the Strand Theatre. Young George Volochiati, seaman, first class, United States Navy, who was wounded at Midway and happened to be in Hollywood on a sick furlough, was a visitor on the set and, naturally enough, was quite absorbed in the proceedings. It was a very tense scene. The men in the giant Flying Fortress aimed their bombs and released them. The Jap ship was hit and exploded. After the take, Producer Howard Hawks turned and smiled at George, and _ said, “Tell me, do you think we put it over as well as you fellows did out at sea?” “Well,” George laughed, “Your people were a lot more excited than we were. We never have time to get nervous.” John Garfield Plans New Group Theatre New York’s famed Group Theatre will have a rebirth in Hollywood if plans now being made by John Garfield, Roman Bohnen, Art Smith, Morris Carnovsky and others mature. Garfield, spark plug for the movement, points out that many writers, actors and _ directors who were the Group in the east are now in Hollywood, and in this sees certainty that the plan will go through. Garfield, now featured in “Air Force” for Warner Bros., meets daily with Bohnen, Smith and Carnovsky, other Group actors at the Warner Studios. Clifford Odets, who wrote many of the Group’s best plays, also is now at Warner Bros., preparing the screen play for “Rhapsody in Blue,” story of George Gershwin. Odets is actively lining up Frances Farmer, Leif Erikson, Luther Adler and other former Groupsters to get the Hollywood organization completed. Father-Son Role For Charles Drake In “Air Force” new Strand Theatre attraction, Charles Drake, as a young bombardier, was supposed to get inspiration from a photo of his dad, pinned on the control board of his plane. In the script his father is Lieut. Monk Hau ser, who flew in the last war with Captain Eddie Rickenbacker. Because no suitable photos were at hand, Drake was dressed in the helmet and flying gear used in World War I, photographed and the picture framed, and so furnished himself with his very own inspiration. Tobias Corporal In Name Only George Tobias was made a corporal in the United States Army Air Corps for the duration of the filming of Warner Bros.’ “Air Force,” opening Friday at the Strand Theatre, most important motion picture project to come out of the war in the Pacific to date. The rating was in name only, and was not official. Nevertheless, he carried an accent, a “dese, dem and doze” cne, according to the script, in this accounting of the battle for air superiority in mid-ocean and the Far East. A mere corporalcy, no matter how Tobias may prize the imaginary title, couldn’t dim the pleasure with which Tobias mutilated the English “langwidge.” Tobias is a reformed taxi driver, more or less fresh from the streets of New York, when the “Air Force” audience first meets: him, helping to make ready a Flying Fortress for a flight to Honolulu. That is on December 6, 1941, a date that gives an inkling of how quickly both Tobias and Director Howard Hawks and his cast and crew get into action in this picture. As Corporal B. B. Weinberg, Tobias carried on in the tradition of his cabby profession, a first class fighting man for his country. He feels this is the best of his many characterizations to date. And his characterizations are legion—that of the New York subway guard in “Sergeant York,” foreman in an airplane factory in “Wings For The Eagle,” a bandit in “Torrid Zone,” and a farmer in “Juke Girl.” Film Reereates Bombing of Hickam Field Gutted and flame-scarred Hickam Field, Honolulu, lived again near Tampa, Fla., where a movie company re-enacted the early stages of America’s activities in the present war. Constructed with the cooperation of the government, the Hickam Field location was accomplished by a crew of more than 100 technicians and workers who began the job more than a month ago. Headed by Director Howard Hawks, whose “Sergeant York” is making screen history, the Hollywood film company selected the Florida location because of its close resemblance to islands and atolls of the South Pacific, where much of the picture’s action transpires. Reclaiming a large swamp area for the Hickam Field locale, the Hollywood technicians added such authentic touches as fire-gutted barracks; devastated runways and demolished control towers, all constructed with such authenticity as to win the commendation of eye-witnesses te the holocaust. Titled “Air Force,” the picture is the result of frequent conferences between government authorities in Washington, including General H. H. “Hap” Arnold, chief of Air Corps, and Warner Bros., the producing company. It was made under the supervision of Majors Sam Triffy and Jack Coulter, Office, Chief of Air Force, Washington, D.C. Major Triffy also colaborated with Hawks and Dudley Nichols, screen writer, on the picture’s script. He also had many pre-production conferences with Hal B. Wallis, producer of the picture. “Air Force,” Warner Bros.’ saga of warfare over the Pacific, opens Friday at the Strand. “Starred” is the “Mary Ann,” a Boeing Flying Fortress, which takes part in the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor, the struggle for Wake Island, the battle of the Coral Sea and then the defense of Australia. The cast of the picture includes John Garfield, Gig Young, Harry Carey, and George Tobias. Mat 106—16c Gig Young 14. Weeks Without a Shave and Not a Beard to Show for It! In the eyes of John Garfield, Gig Young, Harry Carey, George Tobias and his other principals, director Howard Hawks at least for one day became the grandest guy on earth. He told them they could go to the barbershop and get a shave. It sounds sort of trivial. But to the principals in Warner Bros.’ “Air Force,’ coming Friday to the Strand Theatre, it seemed like an event of major importance in life. For fourteen straight weeks they had not been allowed to shave. They hadn’t even had the satisfaction of seeing their beards grow out into something grandiose and luxuriant, something that would give them a certain strut and swagger, maybe make them look fierce. Most of the action of “Air Force” takes place within a given period of a couple of days, after the crew of the Boeing B17 bomber, “Mary Ann,” leaves the west coast for Honolulu just before December 7. What happens to them and what they make happen after that does not include shaving. Fighting over Pearl Harbor, Wake Island, the Coral Sea and Australia certainly leaves little time for that. That is why, at the beginning of each day of filming since the start of the picture, the makeup man would puff a time or two against his electric clippers and cut just the fraction of an inch that represented one _ day’s growth of beard. So there they went these players, in the exceedingly unsatisfactory situation of having a three or four day’s stubble on their faces that never receded or made headway for 14 weeks. In true movie tradition, Hawks had shot the main body of his seript up to the ending and now he was ready to film the beginning —the part where the boys were just taking off from the west coast in the “Mary Ann”—when they were freshly shaven.