I don't know how many different ways to say "Ugh," but this $200 million waste of film is a rather intolerable experience. But it does have one redeeming virtue, though a small one. In the film, the Affleck character spends a brief stint with the Eagle Squadron in Britain.
There is beautiful footage of Spitfires and Messerschmitts in the all-too-brief dogfight sequence over the Dover Cliffs. Exciting air battle footage is digitally enhanced in an impressive way. However, the story around the sequence and the details themselves don't add up right.
Why would a USAAF commanding officer encourage one of his pilots to leave and join the RAF? Also, exactly how does a person with the USAAF leave and join the RAF without going AWOL? Secondly, assuming this is a few months before Pearl Harbor in 1941, daylight raids of any size over Britain had ceased, so what's up with the whole "Battle of Britain" sequence anyway?
When Affleck is shot down, it's assumed he's dead. But, he actually survives. So, how did he get permission to return to the U.S.? I didn't think the RAF was a country club during the war. I would think that Affleck would have gotten picked up and returned to duty like all the other pilots.
Also, it's amazing that one American pilot in the war trains under Doolittle, joins the RAF in the "Battle of Britain," returns to fight in Pearl Harbor, and ends up as a pilot in the Doolittle raid on Tokyo. Talk about streching the limits of coincidence and believability. No wonder veterans walked out of this one.
