Wow – where to begin? No point in starting with the story because there isn't one. We follow the very un-enigmatic John Mills (Peter) in yet another role in which he demonstrates zero star power or stage magnetism. He's in the Royal Air Force during the 2nd World War and we spend some time in his extremely boring company.The whole cast is full of bumbling English twits who have turned up in the RAF at the same time and speak in that ridiculous clipped English, so we get dialogue like "that was a cracking story" being delivered as "that was a crecking story". Ludicrous. The relationships with the women are extremely cold, a sign of the acting style of the time, but still not good. And what's with Douglass Montgomery (Johnny)? He looks exactly like Michael Redgrave (David) and had me fooled that Redgrave was playing two roles in the same film. There is also, of course, a blasted kid in the film. This one can't speak properly and needs to be removed from the set on every appearance. It's a disgrace.What makes people think this rubbish is good? I'd like to know what their problem is. Basically, don't watch this crap – I ended up gazing out of the window during many sections. It's total codswallop and serves no point. Yawn.

In his autobiography "Up in the Clouds,Time Gentlemen Please",John Mills mentions location filming at Catterick (N.Yorks),he also mentions doing a short scene with Trevor Howard.Mills tells his wife that evening that with any luck Howard must become a star one day. The film has what must rank as one of the worst mimes ever with Jean Simmons as a singer,however,her youth and sheer beauty transcends her miming. This is a classic film of the wartime genre with a superb cast.Three supporting actors went on to work together in Brief Encounter. John Mills also mentions in his book (page 278) that the day before he went to Catterick a "doodlebug" (V1 rocket)flew overhead and exploded not far away in Denham Studios near where he lived.

This film is possibly my favorite film. Having seen it late at night on the ABC (Australian) I waited a year reading the television guide regularly until it was on again and taped it. I have since bought it on DVD. This is a brilliant look at the airmen based in Britain during WWII. It doesn't glorify the war or show one bomb dropping over Germany, but it glorifies the Men and Women who lived the times and suffered the war in a time when the fate of the world was uncertain. Touching and truthful. The cast are amazing and the script has a sense of humor which has long been associated with Britain in war times. the relationship between the English and Americans is at times funny when it comes to cultural differences, but as today the two countries stood together.

In 1940 trainee pilot Peter Penrose joins up with the RAF in an airbase in England and is taken under the wing of the more experienced Flight Lt David Archdale. Archdale is happy go lucky, a great pilot and has a young wife and new child. So when Archdale is killed in a sortie over enemy territory it causes Penrose to withdraw into himself – losing contact with his sweetheart and shutting himself off to be able to commit himself to the job.In 1942 the RAF mostly move off the field to be replaced by the Americans who come to be stationed with Penrose and a few other officers. His pain is only one of the troubled interactions and losses to be suffered during this war.This film is the third film from Asquith that I have seen in the last 24 hours – I didn't know he directed them all, I just had them lined up to see and it turned out to be a mini-season of his films. This film opens with a wonderfully atmospheric scene where the camera picks over the bones (not literally) of the now deserted airbase before we jump back in time to see the stories behind the remains. This is a great opening and the rest of the film never really gets up to the same standard even though it does try to deliver a less flag waving look at the human side of the war. It tries to show how loss affects the other pilots (namely Penrose) and also how difficult 'normal' relationship were when so many people were dying; however it has dated badly and the people portrayed are much too stiff and proper. In fairness, at the time, even an honest film would have shied away from showing the pilots really struggling with emotions, but even still the film is certainly not a heroic propaganda piece.The lack of real emotion means that the story itself comes across as rather stiff and, as a result, can occasionally lose the audience – not having any excitement in it to cover the emotional involvement that it lacks. The message is honourable but it has been done better recently simply because the emotion is more relatable and tangible; I support the idea of the stiff upper lip and all that, but in the film's private moments it should have let this drop to show more of the real people. Aside from this, a large section of the film seems to be more about cementing UK/US relations than about any specific story as it is filled with 'oh look how funny are differences are' moments which are OK but hardly hilarious or anything special. The characters follow the script and are mostly upright people and genre clichés – however it is a good thing that they are not the 'perfect' soldiers of many other war films of the period.Without real characters to really work with the cast just deliver the best they can, many giving the same performances they have in plenty of other films like this. That is not necessarily a bad thing though as the cast features a lot of really well known names and faces. Mills is good and he is the one that manages to convey the inner hurt and emotional sacrifice the best; of course he never goes over the top or even sheds a tear but he does a lot with his facial expressions. Redgrave is a good casting choice and his familiarity as a leading man means that we feel his loss a lot more than if he had been a bit player brought in just to die. Montgomery is his replacement but in terms of acting he cannot do it – he is a bit too 'all-American' and unconvincing in his own skin. The support cast is mostly good and features many well known actors of the genre including John, Holloway, Howard, Radford, Owen and others.Overall this is a good film in what it tried to do and maybe at the time it worked really well surrounded by flag waving films of heroic sacrifice and espionage b-movies, but not the lack of tangible emotion has caused it to date quite badly. In some places emotion and feeling is apparent but mostly it is all too stiff and unconvincing, leaving the audience to a lot of the work. Still clever, interesting and worthy enough to be worth seeing, just don't expect it to be as impacting as more obvious modern war movies.