sol1218 **SPOILERS** WWII war movie about the fabled "Flying Tigers" who battled the Japanese over the skies of China as early as 1937, four years before the attack on Pearl Harbor, and amassed a record of air-to-air combat kills against the Japanese air force of something like 40 to 1.The story "God is my Co-Pilot" actually begins in the summer of 1942 with USAF ace Col. Scott, Dennis Morgan, depressed and heart-broken because he can't be part of a major air assault against Japanese forces in China. The movie goes into a flashback where we see how Scott got interested in flying as a young boy back in Georgia and eventually joined the USAF ending up in China as the first US military man to become a member of the "Flying Tigers"; The Tigers were exclusively made up of foreign, mostly Americans,volunteers. As you would expect the "Flying Tigers" airmen aren't that hip to a USAF man who's well over combat age, Scott is 34, joining up with their exclusive flying fighters squadrons. In no time at all Scott gets the hang of it and he becomes the hero, and to the battered and bloodied Japs,villain in the Chinese Theater of War. Back home in Macon Georga Scott's exploits make the front pages and his score of air-to air kills against the Japs are posted daily as if it was the score of a Championship Football or World Series Baseball game. The movie "God is my Co-Pilot" also has a Japanese villain in the person of Japanese air ace Tokyo Joe, Richard Loo, an American educated Japanese combat pilot who, by the number of USAF kill decals under the side-window of his Zero, seemed to have accounted for all the "Flying Tiger" P-40's shot down in China. Scott has a number of encounters with Tokyo Joe during the air combat in the movie and finally shoots him out of the sky by faking that he's in trouble, his engine is on fire, tricking Joe to lose his composure and overshoot his P-40. Scott ends up putting Joe right in the middle of his cross-hairs and thus became history and yesterdays news. Scott on a mission over Japanese held Hong Kong, where he downed Tokyo Joe, loses control of his plane and crashes and is given up for dead only to show up later alive and rescued by the local Chinese peasants. Dennis Morgan is both brave and humble as Col. Robert Lee Scott and even at the hight of the fighting has second thoughts about killing people, Japanese soldiers, even in wartime. Raymond Massey is excellent as the "Flying Tiger" commanded Gen Claire L. Chennault who answers Scott prayers at the end of the movie by giving him one last chance to go into combat. this after he was rendered useless as a combat pilot because of his nerves being shattered, from the combat missions he already flew, and the tropical illnesses he contracted in China. We never really get to know how Scott's last mission turned out since the movie ends before it even begins. Watching the movie it's obvious that it was non-other then Richard Loo as the wise-cracking Japanese air ace Tokyo Joe who has the best lines, which he delivers in perfect English, and the scenes with him interacting with the USAF and "Flying Tiger" pilots, like Col. Scott, are by far the best in the movie.

inspt71-1 God is my Co-Pilot is one of the best War Movies ever made. This movie was not available on Video for a while, and it was after fans have been screaming for it to come out on Video that it was finally released. Dennis Morgan plays Col. Robert Lee Scott, an Army Pilot who was looking for combat duty in World War II. He ends up in China with The Flying Tigers and flies with them on numerous missions. Richard Loo as "Tokyo Joe", a big mouth, over confident Japanese Fighter Pilot who communicates with his enemies over the radio and welcomes any chance to clash with Scott. This movie may not be as accurate as the book but it still a great movie with great combat scenes with P-40s and T-6 Texans as Japanese Zeros.

Robert J. Maxwell I saw this movie on TV as a kid and enjoyed it thoroughly -- Flying Tigers!I saw it again on TV tonight for the second time, and found it to be a howler from beginning to end. It's easy enough to find effective, cheaply made flag-waving propaganda movies made during the war years that have redeeming qualities, properties that make them worth watching. They may be no more than suspenseful actioners, like "Destination Tokyo," or may have more thoughtful narratives embedded in the framework, like Hawks' "Air Force" or "Thirty Seconds Over Tokyo." "God is My Co-Pilot" hasn't got much of anything except a few minutes of good aerial photography. In the air, as usual, a kind of war-time trainer called the "Texan" substitutes for the Japanese Zero-sen, as it did in "Tora! Tora! Tora!" The P-40s are attractive airplanes, with clean lines, although they appear to be Model Es rather than the Cs the AVG used. A small matter. In any case, you can only admire the airplanes for so long before the story line and dialog begin to intrude into your consciousness. Scott's book was a simple, straightforward autobiography. The movie is piled high with extraneous material based on two themes: (1) a vicious and unrelenting racism that must have been offensive to some Americans over the age of ten even in 1945, and (2) something to do with whether Scott believes in God or not -- or was it the other way around? The dialog stretches desperately to reach upward to the level of banality but doesn't quite make it. I think I should give a few examples and leave it at that. Japanese pilot {played by Hawaiian-born Chinese-American Richard Loo} called "Tokyo Joe" radioing to a P-40 he has lined up in his sights: "Just hold it right there, Yank." P-40 pilot radioing back: "Don't call me Yank; I'm from Georgia." American pilot radioing to a Japanese pilot he's shooting down: "Don't look now, but your Zero's showing." American pilot to another Japanese going down in flames: "Now you're a good Jap." General Chennault watching from the ground with a big smile as his pilots slaughter the Japanese: "The boys must be in a good mood today." The real life epilogue? Chennault was a pretty clever guy, forsooth, trained his AVG mercenaries very effectively, and warned everyone back in the Western Hemisphere that the Japanese Zero was a remarkably maneuverable fighter, better than anything we had. (His warning was ignored; the Zero came as a big surprise after Pearl Harbor.) There was no room in the U. S. Army Air Force for a hero like Chennault, who had carved out a reputation in some other air force, namely the Chinese, and he was promptly "disappeared." The original AVG pilots were given the choice of becoming just another couple of guys in the Army Air Force or being kicked out and sent back to the states to be drafted as privates. AVG disbanded. End of Flying Tigers, except in our national mythology.

thebear-4 The actual story is a fascinating one - the Flying Tigers flying over the "Hump" of the Himalayas to resupply and support the Chinese fighting the Japanese Empire. And the dilemma of "Why do I survive?" is a wartime classic. Is is me, my skill, luck or is there a Higher Power watching over me? Some great moments especially with Raymond Massey as General Claire Chennault, the leader of the Tigers are deadened by mundane dialogue and plot.