The Nazis have built a secret weapons factory in Norway.
It is 633 Squadron’s job to destroy it.
To do so, they will have to travel up a fjord through anti-aircraft guns, to bomb a massive rock overhang sheltering the target. After completing that objective, they have to avoid crashing into a sheer mountain range.
If you liked Top Gun - Maverick, this might be up your alley.
A big influence on Star Wars’s Death Star trench run, 633 Squadron kinda does not have anything else to recommend it.
While it is not an ensemble piece, the portrayal of the squadron is interesting for some diversity - one pilot has one hand; one of the pilots is Sikh.
Apart from one crack about the pilot’s hook, the movie makes no exceptions of these characters, either as figures of ridicule or exceptional - they are just a part of the group’s dynamic.
It does not amount to much, but it does give the movie more of a sense of realism, in a minor way.
Overall, the movie is kind of a mush of various ideas and character beats - none of them are that developed, and the effect is somewhat undermined by an abrupt, ambiguous ending.
As the lead, Cliff Robertson plays a veteran pilot who does not care about risking his own life. In one interesting turn, he is pulled off a mid-film flight because of his importance to the final mission.
What stands out is the final raid.
Accomplished through a combination of real planes and miniatures, it is a welcome boost of excitement in a movie that is lacking in it.
It may not be as polished as the films I mentioned at the outset, but it is effective. One wishes the movie around it was more satisfying.
There is a kernel of an idea in the squadron’s dynamic and battle-hardened sense of camaraderie - Howard Hawks would have made a meal of this - but the film never really takes flight.
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