The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)

Very disappointing...

Excellent, Without a doubt!!

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

The story, direction, characters, and writing/dialogue is akin to taking a tranquilizer shot to the neck, but everything else was so well done.

Being very young and actually seeing this film on the big screen, I remember being totally engrossed in the trial of this man who was really a hero. The military doesn't like rebels very much and Mitchelll was just such a rebel. He saw the future of air power in warfare. His record and knowledge of his specialty were public record, but when he began to slam the shortsightedness of his superiors, it didn't work well for him. He faced a court martial and was in the sights of the lawyers who were determined to get him. Many of the films that involved courts martial have as the punishment, the death penalty. This was not on the table because he was dealing with charges of insubordination. His punishment was to be drummed out. I was so lucky to see Gary Cooper in an actual movie theater and be moved by his performance. Some say he was miscast, but I thought he showed a well rounded, solid characterization of Mitchell. Historians may disagree.

Now available on an Olive Films DVD, this movie is a pretty faithful account of Colonel Billy Mitchell's fight against the army and his well-publicized court martial for daring to speak out against and condemn senior officers who were ordering young pilots to their deaths in planes that had no right to be sitting in hangars let alone flying high in the skies. Despite the fact that it's rather static, the court martial itself is the highlight of the movie – especially with the surprise appearance of a young Rod Steiger who takes over the role of cross-examiner. Gary Cooper is okay, but somewhat muted as Mitchell. I always thought Mitchell was much more of a fire-eater than the rather gentle if stubborn character that Cooper and the scriptwriters let loose. By way of contrast, Fred Clark tends to over-act as the chief prosecutor. All told, this bio rates as a creditable re-enactment that holds the interest for 100 minutes despite a somewhat static script and rather disappointingly dull direction from Otto Preminger.

I find it kind of enjoyable in a smooth, Hollywood kind of way. Billy Mitchell did go through the various experiences we see on screen, only not in the particular details shown. The deck is stacked in favor of Gary Cooper as the hero, Billy Mitchell.I read a reasonably balanced biography of Mitchell some years ago and he didn't come across as the idealistic firebrand we see on screen. Rather, as I remember it, he had married well and was something of a social aristocrat, which isn't bad in itself.The story's probably familiar. Mitchell is an advocate of air power and, against orders, blows a test battleship out of the water with out-sized 2,000 pound bombs. For this he's sent to Siberia in Texas. When his friend in killed in an airship accident and other friends expire in a cross-country flight, he makes a public announcement accusing the War Department of being "criminally negligent" and "almost treasonable." For this he gets a court martial, found guilty, and is cashiered.He was evidently correct about a number of things. The day of the battleship was limited. The majority lost by all sides in World War II were sunk by airplanes. No air force ever used 2,000 pound bombs though, with one exception (the Tirpitz) to sink them. Nor did air supremacy ever win a war by itself. Not in World War II -- and not since then.The best scene -- both the most dramatic and the most unintentionally comic -- is the court martial scene. Every participant in the trial has a single dimension. There are the good guys and the bad guys. The bad guys are winning at the start but the tide turns and they lose. The last witness is Mitchell himself. He not only has to undergo the agonizing ordeal of being cross-examined by a particularly slimy and sarcastic Rod Steiger but he must be suffering from an attack of malaria at the same time. Man, does he suffer. He keeps a handkerchief to his face, patting away the sweat.I don't recall from his biography whether Mitchell actually made the predictions attributed to him by the film. They include a surprise attack on Pearl Harbor by planes from aircraft carriers 150 miles off the Hawaiian coast. The enemy will be the Japanese. He also calls for the Air Force as an independent branch of the armed forces. This is, like, 1927, mind you. Steiger keeps making snotty references to Mitchell's "crystal ball." A friend and I made up outrageous Mitchell predictions that might have been cut from the script. The Finns will build an undersea tunnel and fly airplanes that will come out of a Washington sewer and bomb the White House, and so forth. Well -- who knows? Anyway I get a kick out of it. Worth catching if you don't care much about historical accuracy.Oh -- and Kids, in 1941 the Japanese actually DID do what Billy Mitchell said they would. It began what we call "World War II." PS: We won.

In the USAF we were taught about Billy Mitchell as being the "Father of the Air Force", and how he sacrificed his career to bring attention to his points.What a good movie. Rod Steiger did steal the scenes, and I suspect that James Cagney would have made a better movie... but I found myself becoming drawn in by Gary Cooper's portrayal of Billy Mitchell. He might have been a bit long in the tooth, but remember, the real Billy Mitchell was 46 years old at the time of his Court Martial, at about the age when he should start thinking about retirement anyhow.It plays like a stage play; the story is enough to make a powerful punch. 2 Thumbs Up. See it. Get it on DVD if you can, so you can read the subtitles and not miss a thing.