A Veteran Ranks 10 WW2 Air War Movies By What They Got Right!

Ten WW2 aviation movies ranked the only way that counts on this channel ... not by how pretty they are, but by how hard they hit. American airmen over Europe, packed into a freezing aluminum tube at twenty-five thousand feet, where the flak's so thick you could walk on it. Sam runs the list from the bottom up: Captains of the Clouds (1942) as the "before" picture, with Cagney and a real Billy Bishop acting his heart out at an empty sky; the gloriously strange Death Race (1973), a grounded P-40 chased across the desert by a Sherman dressed up as Afrika Korps armor; and The Thousand Plane Raid (1969), which lifted a famous belly landing straight out of another film ... a recycled crash you'll see turn up again and again as the countdown climbs. Desperate Journey (1942) has Errol Flynn and a young Ronald Reagan, Red Tails (2012) carries the Tuskegee Airmen and George Lucas's ninety million dollars, and Wolf Hound (2022) answers it with real P-51s, a real Spitfire, and not a frame of CGI. The top of the list is where the iron and the honesty meet. The War Lover (1962) and Steve McQueen, flying three patched-together Fortresses made to look like a whole bomber group. Command Decision (1948), written by a man who spent forty-one months in Curtis LeMay's map room, starring Clark Gable ... who really did fly five combat missions over Europe as a waist gunner. Twelve O'Clock High (1949), the Gregory Peck picture the Air Force used as a leadership training film for decades, and the birthplace of that famous Paul Mantz belly landing. And at number one, Memphis Belle (1990), built on five of the last eight flyable B-17s on earth and the bloodline of William Wyler's real 1944 combat footage. This is WW2 air-war cinema graded down to the rivets ...real warbirds versus computer skies, recycled crashes, one-legged stunt pilots, and the men who flew the real missions and came home and said nothing. Where do you land on real iron versus CGI? Tell Sam below. IN THIS REPORT (10 → 1) #10. Captains of the Clouds (1942) #9. Death Race (1973) #8. The Thousand Plane Raid (1969) #7. Desperate Journey (1942) #6. Red Tails (2012) #5. Wolf Hound (2022) #4. The War Lover (1962) #3. Command Decision (1948) #2. Twelve O'Clock High (1949) #1. Memphis Belle (1990)