1955 - Dir: Michael Anderson - 2 hours 4 minutes
Shown at The FeckenOdeon on 25th February, 2012
Although this was described at its opening as a "war film" it’s really the grandfather of the modern "docudrama". The director worked for 2 years researching the characters and events and the result is an accurate and gripping realisation of the what actually happened. He decided to shoot the film in black and white, in order to allow the integration of original footage of the bomb trials, and to preserve a 'gritty', documentary-style reality. By good fortune, the Ruhr was in flood at the time of shooting, allowing the crew to film the flooded towns and valleys and incorporate this into the closing scenes. As a reconstruction of one of the great moments of a long and bloody war, this could hardly be bettered today, even with the aid of CGI. Michael Anderson had three bombers at his disposal (hired from the RAF for £130 a day) and he makes them look like a full squadron. The Dam Busters stood head and shoulders above the stiff-uppered, jolly-good-show-chaps, congratulatory, feel right, post war propaganda movies of the time, in which Tommy was brave and Fritz wasn’t. It is testament to Anderson's authoritative, quiet guidance that the performances are largely realistic, and multi-dimensional. The end of the film might, in other hands, be an opportunity for jingoistic flag-waving, but instead Anderson emphasises the human cost of war without falling into sentimentality.
- The bombs shown were the wrong shape because the actual shape (a stubby cylinder) was still secret at the time this film was made. Much of the footage of the bombs bouncing was taken from film of the real tests but the shots were doctored to conceal the secret "back spin" that caused them to bounce.
- The film opened 12 years to the day of the actual raid
- Gibson's dog "Nigger" was dubbed into "Trigger" for the sensitive US market. The dog that played him was also called "Nigger". One wonders what he’ll be called in the forthcoming re-make!
