The McConnell Story

I started watching this movie without knowing anything about the characters. I fell in love with it almost immediately! In fact, I watched it a second time with my husband. The story line is easy to follow and is faithful to Joe's real life story. The fight scenes when he's serving in the Korean War were well done, in my opinion. This movie made in 1955 only a year after his death was faithful to their lives together.

i always thought Alan Ladd was not an exciting actor. his height was not impressive and always gave me a midget feeling, an actor too short to play big roles in any movie. if it was not the script that made him a greater hero, he would never become a memorable actor like other taller actors. about 95% of this film was unnecessary yada yada scenes and the other 5% left was barely watchable which included the boring air dog fights with the MIGs that didn't seem with any suspenseful tension, the dialog during the air support mission also sounded boring, then the small part of the 5% showed how this guy as a test pilot and crashed himself to death in a fireball also didn't create any heartfelt feeling at all to me. this film was one of the worst military films that i've ever viewed and very very forgettable and not even needed to write a positive review.

Typical 1950s fluff about a great, yet tragic hero. Entertaining for a rainy night, nothing else. However, it should be noted that the saddest movie star that ever lived, Alan Ladd, finally found some happiness in making this film. He fell in love with his co-star June Allyson; only problem, both were married at the time. Seems June looked alot like Ladd's first wife; his highschool sweetheart. Alas, Mr.Ladd's happiness was short-lived, as was he.

Even for a 1950s "wave the flag" movie, this film's plot is just, well, very bad. It is cliche ridden and inaccurate. The real Capt. Joe McConnell, Korea's highest scoring ace, got all his 16 air to air victories in just the last six months of the Korean War, and was shot down once himself. This could have made for an exciting docudrama. Instead, the director chose to do something less than a high school drama presentation showing June Allison flittering around with her screechy dialogue and Alan Ladd wearing his G-suit too low on his waist. (Never mind the inaccuracies like showing Ladd in a B-17 in WW 2, when McConnell was a B-24 nav).

The "aerial combat sequences" were laughable, especially the F-86s waltzing to AFN radio.

A much better period piece is "The Hunters" with Robert Mitchum.

It's WWII. Army private Joseph "Mac" McConnell, Jr. (Alan Ladd) goes AWOL to learn to fly and escapes from the MPs. He gets a ride from teenager Bob Brown and falls for Bob's sister Pearl (June Allyson) whom he calls Butch. He becomes a gunner in a bomber. Next he becomes a jet test pilot. During the Korean war, he becomes a flying ace.

It's a silly start to a serious biopic of a war hero. It can't be the truth although maybe it is. The light tone is just accentuating the blandness of the story. It's old fashion and lacking in drama. I don't mind the romantic pairing but a little massaging could generate a better meet-cute. Why can't she be the one who picks him up after the parachute? Are they strictly keeping to the real history? I doubt it. The war fighting in the first hour is not the best but it's still better than the ground level story. At least, it has some real flying footage and that saves this relatively flat war biopic. After the first hour, the fighting becomes some nice jet dogfights. It's great to see these old jets up close and in combat. It's really the only truly compelling aspect of this film.