The Hunters [HD]

Jet-Propelled Action !
"The Hunters" is a well-made, exciting Korean war drama, with the accent on aviation. It has an above-average plot for this type of film, and the whole movie, particularly the aerial sequences, is expertly directed by Dick Powell. If you are interested in combat aircraft, there are many scenes of F-86 Sabre Jets engaging MIGs in dogfight battles to the death.

While the planes are great to watch, this film is primarily about human beings caught up in war. It stars Robert Mitchum, and he is terrific--his fighter pilot character is a born leader, yet he also suspects there is something important missing in his life. He enters into a guilt-ridden relationship with the wife of another pilot, played by lovely May Britt. When there's a war on though, the feelings of two people aren't worth--as someone once said--"a hill of beans". Mr. Mitchum's main job is to lead a fighter squadron, and satisfy his boss on the ground--Richard Egan in a strong performance, knowing that every day he may be...

The F-86 is sexier than May Britt
I was quite eager to acquire a DVD copy of "The Hunters" when I learned of its availability. My faded recollections of this Korean War flying epic long ago had melded into a vague and adolescent montage of childhood images of F-86 dogfights led by an aging Cleve Saville (Robert Mitchum), a cocksure would-be ace and young beatnik-like wingman, Lt.Ed Pell (Robert Wagner), the base commander (Richard Egan) who's memorable one-liner "The Iceman Cometh!" was enthusiastically uttered while observing Saville's aerial prowess through a pair of field binoculars, and of course an enemy ace named Casey Jones. When the movie stuck to flying, it was cutting edge and it was great. The aerial photography was fabulous. The F-86 Saber Jet was one classically beautiful and superb flying machine and its historic role helped define aerial combat in Korea. But alas, when the flying sequences deferred to a ridiculously improbable love triangle, "The Hunters" had a way of...

The Citizen Kane of modern air/space combat movies!
When I was 11 years old, I saw this movie when it was released. In its air combat sequences, The Hunters is the Citizen Kane of all modern air/space combat movies, as revolutionary for its time as Star Wars later was to be for its time. While prior air combat movies had been on the square screens, usually in B&W, The Hunters was filmed in state-of-the art CinemaScope (widescreen) and Technicolor. Its air combat sequences -- twisting jets on each other's tails soaring in mountainous clouds, then diving and roaring a treetop level through valleys -- were brilliantly conceived and breathtakingly executed -- unlike anything that had been seen before. They still hold up with the best ever filmed, although they've been copied so much (by movies such as Top Gun and Star Wars) that they no longer have the knock-your-socks-off novelty that they originally did. Unfortunately, the feel-good screenplay, with a distracting romantic subplot, bears no resemblance to the gritty, macho novel on...

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