Air Force (DVD)

The Flying Fortress Mary-Ann and its crew leave San Francisco for Honolulu on the day before Japan's sneak attack on Pearl Harbor...and fly right into World War II. Howard Hawks guides one of Hollywood's greatest battle epics, a flag-waving, Oscar-winning film of courage, camaraderie and combat as the Mary-Ann hopscotches from Hawaii to Wake Island to the Philippines to the Coral Sea to Australia. A gifted ensemble cast - including John Garfield and Harry Carey - plays ordinary Americans called upon to do the extraordinary. As if the film itself wasn't a reminder of war's costs, true life underscored that reality. The B-17 seen in many of the scenes would later be lost in action with its crew over the Pacific.