The Planes of Tora Tora Tora

[Emil Frand]

http://daveswarbirds.com/tora/aircraft.htm

[OBIO]

I just watched Tora! Tora! Tora! the other night. One of the great WW2 movies that will remain highly watchable for a few more generations I would say.

OBIO

[aeromed202]

I always liked this one for it's plain telling of the story. No gummy sides of romance or preposterous coincidences (cough, cough, afflek, cough). Darn close to the facts too, for hollywood. In the top 10 for me.

[Bomber_12th]

Very cool site!

Notice the page that is titled "Miscellaneous Aircraft", and on the bottom of it there is a picture showing a B-25 hulk with a single vertical fin tail fitted, and the question is posted as to why it was done. The reason for this was that at the time of the attack on Pearl Harbor, there were no B-25's on the island. There were however several A-20's on the island at the time of the attack, and in the scene where only the tail of the B-25 can be seen, from a ways off, it was meant to appear as one of these A-20's. From the vantage point that is shown of it in the movie, it pulls it off very well.

I've always enjoyed the fact that despite what was available to work with when the movie was made, those in charge tried very, very hard to do it right. The vast majority of the original Zero/Kate/Val replicas are still flying today with their original modifications in-place, and I think it has to be said, that the reason for this is that the work that was done in order to configure the BT-13/15's and AT-6's as such, was done as well as it was.

[SpitXIV]

I have to agree, Tora Tora Tora was\still is one of the best movies to cover that
subject at the time. :)

[wombat666]

It holds up rather well, in fact, it does far better than the terrible 'Midway' that turned up a few years later.
The modified aircraft were very convincing, and IIRC most were flown at the time in the original 'Confederate Air Force' Airshows buy a group of enthusiastic members of 'The Gulf Air Wing'.
:applause:

[pilottj]

Tora Tora Tora is one of my all time favorite aviation movies next to the Right Stuff. For me it was waaaay better than the Bruckheimer/Bay production of the Pearl Harbor story.

[stansdds]

Tora, Tora, Tora is one of my favorites too.

[TARPSBird]

I've always considered Midway to be a lower-budget sequel to Tora Tora Tora, kinda like Frazier was a spin-off of Cheers on TV. Other than the big-name actors there wasn't much substance to Midway, most of the combat footage was stock stuff dating back to The Fighting Lady. The battle has been covered much better in numerous books and a couple good TV documentaries.

[Wild Bill Kelso]

Another remarkable thing about Tora! Tora! Tora! in my eyes is the way it handles the Japanese perspective (if I'm not too wrong, even a Japanese director was responsible for their scenes). The result is a well-balanced attitude which can't be taken for granted in a war movie!
Maybe Clint Eastwood got inspred by this in his outstanding Iwo Jima double feature...

Cheers,
Markus.