Diagonaldi Very well executed

Vashirdfel Simply A Masterpiece

Fluentiama Perfect cast and a good story

MoPoshy Absolutely brilliant

JohnHowardReid War and film noir occasionally do go together. Certainly such films as Bill Wellman's inexorably realistic The Story of G.I. Joe (1945) in which Burgess Meredith so memorably portrayed real-life war correspondent Ernie Pyle, Mark Robson's Home of the Brave (1949), and of course Fred Zinnemann's scorching, gritty From Here To Eternity (1953) would qualify; but most war pictures fall into the flag-waving, mindlessly silver-wrapped action bracket.Such a one is Otto Preminger's star-studded In Harm's Way (1965), which is only occasionally of interest when John Wayne, Kirk Douglas, Patricia Neal, Tom Tryon and Brandon de Wilde are not on the screen and the more charismatic actors like Burgess Meredith, Stanley Holloway, Henry Fonda, Patrick O'Neal and Barbara Bouchet enjoy their brief innings. It's a pity Preminger was not able to cast himself in any role but a fleeting walk-through as a naval officer in the opening tracking shot at the dance. He actually dominates the movie's trailers which he both hosts and narrates.

vincentlynch-moonoi Problem # 1 has to do with budget. If they didn't tell you the air attack early on in the film was the bombing of Pearl Harbor, you'd hardly know it. Seemed very minor according to this film. But, of course, no special effects of note back then, so the attack on Pearl Harbor seems like a slight unpleasantness.Problem # 2: Now, I don't know how it was, but about 8 weeks after the devastating attack on Pearl Harbor it seems as if everything in Honolulu was back to normal and the military was partying it up. Is that really the way it was? I doubt it, but again, I don't know. But then, there's not another bomb or even firecracker that goes off for well over an hour. Kinda sparse action for a war movie Problem # 3: Filmed in 1965 and still black and white. Again, must be budget. Filmed in Hawaii and region, it would have been a beautiful film in color.Problem # 4: It took me a long time to figure out this one. The film takes place in the 1940s, but it feels too much like the 1960s. Oh, they have all the right automobiles and such, but the music seems There are other elements of this movie that balance things out and make it a very good film. Chief among these is the cast: John Wayne, Kirk Douglas, Patricia Neal, Burgess Meredith, Tom Tryon, Dana Andrews, Franchot Tone, Carroll O'Connor, Henry Fonda, and many more, all with varying levels of roles, some rather short, but all key in some way.Of course, the main character here is John Wayne, who was beginning to look kinda old here. Wayne made one of my favorite films the same year -- "The Sons Of Katie Elder". Wayne here plays John Wayne. Which is fine.Kirk Douglas plays a personal ne'er do well, but a competent junior officer to John Wayne (who, BTW, is promoted to admiral during the film). I'm not sure you can be both, but Douglas is always Douglas.Patricia Neal does very nicely as John Wayne's love interest.Dana Andrews has a strong role as a not-so-effective vice-admiral. He's excellent! Burgess Meredith has a part that is different from his typical. Very good performance.So now it's time to get down to the nitty gritty, and this is it: I rarely like war movies. My father was in the military, and almost every time he would come home on leave, he would drag me to the theater to watch a war movie. I loved having time with him, but HATED war movies. Even though I love old movies, it is extremely rare for me to watch a war movie. BUT -- I enjoyed this movie despite its shortcomings. It's a long movie, and it fully held my attention.Recommended.

arfdawg-1 John Wayne. Kirk Douglas. Paula Prentis. Otto Preminger. Hmm.I'm not so familiar with Preminger's work, so this was an eye-opener to me. The B&W photography is amazing. So rich.The film has a slow exposition. That's not a bad thing. It's a good, not great, movie.The Plot Captain Rockwell Torrey and Commander Paul Eddington are part of the Navy's effort to recuperate from, and retaliate for, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. Torrey is romantically involved with nurse Maggie Haynes, and also tries to restore his relationship with his estranged son, Jeremiah, a young Naval officer.

oldgringo2001 I actually read the novel, and the movie is much more faithful to it than most screen adoptions. I agree that the model work was quite poor, but extremely forgivable given the strong story-line and acting. It captures the feel of the naval war in the Pacific for the Americans quite well. Since quite a number of other reviewers have agreed with me, the rest of this review will concentrate on differences between the movie and what actually happened.Motor torpedo boats did sink a battleship once--in World War I. The PT boats of this war never sank anything larger than a destroyer, and few of those. Many had their torpedoes removed to fit small cannons, useful for sinking barges and floating drums. While new craft could reach 40 knots in calm water, engines tended to wear out quickly, and in combat conditions, the PT boats were generally slower than the ships they were trying to attack.There never was a daylight battle between any Japanese battleships and American cruisers. There were two night battles, one at Guadalcanal and one at Surigao Strait in the Philippines, and in the latter, the American cruisers were backed by six battleships, versus only two Japanese battleships and one cruiser.The mighty Yamato never fought anything more formidable than destroyers, and doesn't seem to have scored a single hit on an enemy vessel. Her sister Musashi never sighted an enemy vessel. Both were sunk by aircraft. Their poor performance might be explained by their spending most of the war at anchor. They were comfortable ships even for enlisted men, at least by the standards of the Japanese navy of the time. Yamato was often called "the Yamato Hotel" and the Musashi "the Palace."The U.S. Navy did very little mining during World War II. Laying mines to protect Guadalcanal would have been a wonderful idea, but then, as now, mines were unpopular weapons with the admirals. The final battle in the movie and the novel seems to be most similar to a night battle on November 13, 1942 between a US force of cruisers and destroyers and a Japanese task force built around two older battleships (each about half the size of Yamato). The US force suffered heavy casualties and two US Admirals were killed, but it crippled one of the battleships, leaving it vulnerable to US bombers the next day.