**SPOILERS** WWII war movie about the fabled "Flying Tigers" who battled the Japanese over the skies of China as early as 1937, four years before the attack on Pearl Harbor, and amassed a record of air-to-air combat kills against the Japanese air force of something like 40 to 1.
The story "God is my Co-Pilot" actually begins in the summer of 1942 with USAF ace Col. Scott, Dennis Morgan, depressed and heart-broken because he can't be part of a major air assault against Japanese forces in China. The movie goes into a flashback where we see how Scott got interested in flying as a young boy back in Georgia and eventually joined the USAF ending up in China as the first US military man to become a member of the "Flying Tigers"; The Tigers were exclusively made up of foreign, mostly Americans,volunteers.
As you would expect the "Flying Tigers" airmen aren't that hip to a USAF man who's well over combat age, Scott is 34, joining up with their exclusive flying fighters squadrons. In no time at all Scott gets the hang of it and he becomes the hero, and to the battered and bloodied Japs,villain in the Chinese Theater of War. Back home in Macon Georga Scott's exploits make the front pages and his score of air-to air kills against the Japs are posted daily as if it was the score of a Championship Football or World Series Baseball game.
The movie "God is my Co-Pilot" also has a Japanese villain in the person of Japanese air ace Tokyo Joe, Richard Loo, an American educated Japanese combat pilot who, by the number of USAF kill decals under the side-window of his Zero, seemed to have accounted for all the "Flying Tiger" P-40's shot down in China. Scott has a number of encounters with Tokyo Joe during the air combat in the movie and finally shoots him out of the sky by faking that he's in trouble, his engine is on fire, tricking Joe to lose his composure and overshoot his P-40. Scott ends up putting Joe right in the middle of his cross-hairs and thus became history and yesterdays news. Scott on a mission over Japanese held Hong Kong, where he downed Tokyo Joe, loses control of his plane and crashes and is given up for dead only to show up later alive and rescued by the local Chinese peasants.
Dennis Morgan is both brave and humble as Col. Robert Lee Scott and even at the hight of the fighting has second thoughts about killing people, Japanese soldiers, even in wartime. Raymond Massey is excellent as the "Flying Tiger" commanded Gen Claire L. Chennault who answers Scott prayers at the end of the movie by giving him one last chance to go into combat. this after he was rendered useless as a combat pilot because of his nerves being shattered, from the combat missions he already flew, and the tropical illnesses he contracted in China. We never really get to know how Scott's last mission turned out since the movie ends before it even begins.
Watching the movie it's obvious that it was non-other then Richard Loo as the wise-cracking Japanese air ace Tokyo Joe who has the best lines, which he delivers in perfect English, and the scenes with him interacting with the USAF and "Flying Tiger" pilots, like Col. Scott, are by far the best in the movie.
The story "God is my Co-Pilot" actually begins in the summer of 1942 with USAF ace Col. Scott, Dennis Morgan, depressed and heart-broken because he can't be part of a major air assault against Japanese forces in China. The movie goes into a flashback where we see how Scott got interested in flying as a young boy back in Georgia and eventually joined the USAF ending up in China as the first US military man to become a member of the "Flying Tigers"; The Tigers were exclusively made up of foreign, mostly Americans,volunteers.
As you would expect the "Flying Tigers" airmen aren't that hip to a USAF man who's well over combat age, Scott is 34, joining up with their exclusive flying fighters squadrons. In no time at all Scott gets the hang of it and he becomes the hero, and to the battered and bloodied Japs,villain in the Chinese Theater of War. Back home in Macon Georga Scott's exploits make the front pages and his score of air-to air kills against the Japs are posted daily as if it was the score of a Championship Football or World Series Baseball game.
The movie "God is my Co-Pilot" also has a Japanese villain in the person of Japanese air ace Tokyo Joe, Richard Loo, an American educated Japanese combat pilot who, by the number of USAF kill decals under the side-window of his Zero, seemed to have accounted for all the "Flying Tiger" P-40's shot down in China. Scott has a number of encounters with Tokyo Joe during the air combat in the movie and finally shoots him out of the sky by faking that he's in trouble, his engine is on fire, tricking Joe to lose his composure and overshoot his P-40. Scott ends up putting Joe right in the middle of his cross-hairs and thus became history and yesterdays news. Scott on a mission over Japanese held Hong Kong, where he downed Tokyo Joe, loses control of his plane and crashes and is given up for dead only to show up later alive and rescued by the local Chinese peasants.
Dennis Morgan is both brave and humble as Col. Robert Lee Scott and even at the hight of the fighting has second thoughts about killing people, Japanese soldiers, even in wartime. Raymond Massey is excellent as the "Flying Tiger" commanded Gen Claire L. Chennault who answers Scott prayers at the end of the movie by giving him one last chance to go into combat. this after he was rendered useless as a combat pilot because of his nerves being shattered, from the combat missions he already flew, and the tropical illnesses he contracted in China. We never really get to know how Scott's last mission turned out since the movie ends before it even begins.
Watching the movie it's obvious that it was non-other then Richard Loo as the wise-cracking Japanese air ace Tokyo Joe who has the best lines, which he delivers in perfect English, and the scenes with him interacting with the USAF and "Flying Tiger" pilots, like Col. Scott, are by far the best in the movie.
