Winning Your Wings

Jimmy Stewart appears in one of the many Warner Brothers' short subjects hyping the Army Air Corps. Stewart uses his casual charm and his stage training to hype the Force, and talks about training, and how women love a pilot. It's all done in good humor, and makes it seem like a lot of fun, with no risk mentioned and $400 a month, with room and board!

Stewart had been drafted into the Army as a private in 1940; since he was already a pilot, he was assigned to the Air Corps --after being rejected twice as underweight -- first as an instructor, then on combat missions in Europe. He left the War a Colonel, and as a Reserve officer, retired with the rank of Brigadier General.

Jimmy Stewart presents and narrates this recruitment film for the US Army Air Force and he does it quite charismatically, too! He was a lieutenant during the war, and with his boyish good looks and cheeky smile then who better to advocate to the young men of America that they join him? We've a sort of Q&A session with him answering questions about age, salary and eligibility before he sets off explaining the myriad of job opportunities available as tens of thousands of fliers and ground staff are required. With jobs from pilots to navigators, armament officers to meteorologists and photographers, he makes it quite clear that there is scope for anyone - regardless of their academic prowess - to sign up. It's also about teamwork and maturing as an individual as much as it about fighting and making the folks at home proud, and using archive of a variety of kit that will be used, it's designed to appeal to any patriotic young man keen to get involved. It does play the propaganda card, and of course everything they have or use is "the best in the world" but by using a star like this, John Huston creates a short feature that's less heavy on the flag waving and more on the chance to make a difference. Worth a watch.

Wonderful curio for WWII buffs, aviation buffs, and Jimmy Stewart fans. It's a recruitment film for the U.S. Army Air Forces. There are various young men presented who want to serve but have questions. Stewart answers their questions and provides info about the Air Forces. And yes, it was called Air Forces back then before the 's' was dropped in 1947. There's a lot of interesting information here about the process in joining the AAF and learning to fly. Also of interest to film buffs, this marks the one time that John Huston and Jimmy Stewart worked together. Very cool.

One final note over a comment I read that got under my skin. There is nothing about this that needs to be "excused." No one needs to explain, justify, rationalize, and certainly not apologize for serving their country and encouraging others to do the same. Not in peacetime and definitely not in wartime.

James Stewart is absolutely charming as "Wild Blue Yonder" plays and he taxis up the run-way and hops out of a B17 bomber in uniform complete with wings. He is the sole voice of this 20 minute short from 1942 about why young men should sign up for the Army Air Corps ASAP. He talks to actors portraying college students, high school students, men who didn't finish their college degrees, and an average Joe working at a gas station.

Stewart tells all of these guys that their stations in life - no college, some college, waiting to get out of college - is no bar to getting into the Army Air Corps. But he does mention that business of getting your name pulled out of a fish bowl - aka "drafted" - as a kind of added incentive to join up. One surprising fact - that in this "greatest mass mobilization in history" you could join the Air Corps and finish your degree as a reservist, then become a regular airman.

The short shows much of how America wanted to see itself in 1942 - Stewart shows a dramatization of a young man who just signed up leaving home. He says goodbye to his parents, his aunt, his sister, and "that sweet young thing" next door. Hey, did we just segue into an Andy Hardy film? Nope, the airman to be is too tall to be Mickey Rooney.

Stewart then goes into detail about the jobs that must be done on the ground and in the air to keep 'em flying. On board the plane - radio man, engineer, navigator, bombardier, photographer. He mentions that all get their wings, and all are an important part of a team. This is probably to not get the recruit's hopes up that he will be a pilot.

Stewart was a great salesman for joining up. After all, a tremendously popular actor in 1941, he quit his movie career to join the Army Air Corps himself, having to practically make himself ill eating pound cake and drinking milk so he would meet the minimum weight for enlisting. He retired as a brigadier general in 1968.

This is worth your time to see the tremendous charm of James Stewart and how his love for the Air Corps comes shining through, and as a bit of history on what the Air Corps looked like at the beginning of WWII.

I was lucky enough to get to see this recruiting film on TCM this morning with James Stewart this morning. Before going off to Europe and flying several bombing missions over Axis territory in the next four years, Stewart stopped by Warner Brothers long enough to make this recruitment film.

What's ironic here is that those who didn't take to the skies and became infantrymen would have nothing, but derision for films like these. Despite the contributions of the Army Air Corps which were certainly real enough, those who weren't in that service felt these guys got all the glamor. You can see that idea running through any number of war films.

Still it was interesting to see such folks as Charles Drake, Peter Graves, Don DeFore and Ray Montgomery before they became recognizable civilian actors.

James Stewart had three loves in his life, Gloria, acting, and flying and this was I'm sure a labor of love for him.