A tale of war and romance mixed in with history. The story follows two lifelong friends and a beautiful nurse who are caught up in the horror of an infamous Sunday morning in 1941.
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Director:
Michael Bay
Stars:
Bruce Willis,
Billy Bob Thornton,
Ben Affleck
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Pearl Harbor is a classic tale of romance set during a war that complicates everything. It all starts when childhood friends Rafe and Danny become Army Air Corps pilots and meet Evelyn, a Navy nurse. Rafe falls head over heels and he and Evelyn and Rafe hook up. Then Rafe volunteers to go fight in Britain, and Evelyn and Danny get transferred to Pearl Harbor. While Rafe is off fighting, suddenly one morning comes the air raid we now know as "Pearl Harbor."Written by
shoppingurl3
To a certain extent, Rafe McCawley (Ben Affleck) is based on real fighter pilot Joe Foss, who had thirty-two confirmed kills during the War, and many more probables. McCawley's speech about the plane feeling like an extension of his body was taken almost verbatim from a conversation Michael Bay had with Foss. See more »
Goofs
During the practice runs for the Doolittle raid, the B25s are heard to squeal their tires and fishtail under the heavy throttle at takeoff. As all airplanes are prop or jet powered, not wheel powered, this would be impossible. However in order to achieve the short take off, the brakes were locked on and the engines run to full power before releasing the brakes, the squeal would have been caused by the engines power starting to drag the locked wheels along the tarmac. See more »
Quotes
Danny:
You know he taught me to fly, I always knew that not matter what kind of trouble I got into, I wouldn't be in it alone, he'd be there with me. Up there he was always pushin me to be better and faster.
Evelyn:
He told me you were a great flyer... The same night he told me, he volunteered to go to England.
Danny:
He volunteered? He-he told me he'd been assigned. He was always tryin to protect me. But ya know what I look at myself in the mirror in this uniform... and I still don't know who I am, I look like a hero...
[...] See more »
Crazy Credits
Unusually, Pearl Harbor started without showing the opening Touchstone and Bruckheimer logos; they only showed up after the end credits. See more »
Alternate Versions
DVD version in Hong Kong is also similar to the one in Japan as described, but:
the December 7th date is NOT changed;
Colonel James Doolittle's (Alec Baldwin) line "Kill as many of those bastards as possible" was changed to "I myself would choose a sweet little target";
a scene showing Japanese women in traditional kimonos and carrying parasols during Doolittle's Raid on Tokyo was NOT omitted.
Right up front, let me confess to having been a World War II nut since early childhood. You may thus understand the depths of my disappointment with this movie. I believe Roger Ebert said it best: "The Japanese attack an American love triangle." I find it inexcusable that such a pivotal event in history, and one as well documented from just about all angles, can come in for such slipshod treatment at the hands of moviemakers, but I guess I shouldn't be too surprised. Just let down.
If the producers can expend so much time, money and effort to make everything look big and splashy, why not go the extra 1/4 mile and make it look *right*? Spielberg managed it for Saving Private Ryan, even with the somewhat far-fetched plot device. Flaws abound, and have been pointed out in great depth elsewhere (the most glaring are the guided missile frigates in the harbor, the off-scale appearance of the Oklahoma as she capsizes (with an impossible torpedo hole in her starboard side, which was shielded by the Maryland *and* Ford Island), no mention of Nevada's dramatic attempt to get underway and subsequent beaching, etc).
To my legion of fellow critics I say, "read your history before trashing the 'token black' Dorie Miller subplot". Ship's Cook 3rd Miller did, in fact, give aid and comfort to West Virginia's dying captain, did, in fact, man a machine gun for 15 minutes (during which he believed he shot down a Japanese plane) and was, in fact, the first black recipient of the Navy Cross (awarded in early 1942 by Admiral Nimitz). Aside from the mistaken coffee-service bit (he was actually bagging laundry at the time) that was one of the things the producers got *right*.
Focusing on the Dolittle Raid, I saw only lost opportunities - how Dolittle convinced his superiors to let him fly, the fates of the crews (who flew solo rather than in formation and were scattered all over the place afterwards) and Dolittle's dejection at the "failed" raid and his subsequent accolades... all of this was jettisoned as the producers got out the Ritz crackers and Velveeta and went for the cheesy, contrived, convenient resolution of the *important* part of the movie, that cockamamie love triangle.
In sum, so many opportunities, so little follow through. Rent "In Harm's Way" for schmaltz, and "Tora Tora Tora" for the attack itself. Better yet, snag a copy of "At Dawn We Slept", and read up on the historical tapestry that this movie never really touched.
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Right up front, let me confess to having been a World War II nut since early childhood. You may thus understand the depths of my disappointment with this movie. I believe Roger Ebert said it best: "The Japanese attack an American love triangle." I find it inexcusable that such a pivotal event in history, and one as well documented from just about all angles, can come in for such slipshod treatment at the hands of moviemakers, but I guess I shouldn't be too surprised. Just let down.
If the producers can expend so much time, money and effort to make everything look big and splashy, why not go the extra 1/4 mile and make it look *right*? Spielberg managed it for Saving Private Ryan, even with the somewhat far-fetched plot device. Flaws abound, and have been pointed out in great depth elsewhere (the most glaring are the guided missile frigates in the harbor, the off-scale appearance of the Oklahoma as she capsizes (with an impossible torpedo hole in her starboard side, which was shielded by the Maryland *and* Ford Island), no mention of Nevada's dramatic attempt to get underway and subsequent beaching, etc).
To my legion of fellow critics I say, "read your history before trashing the 'token black' Dorie Miller subplot". Ship's Cook 3rd Miller did, in fact, give aid and comfort to West Virginia's dying captain, did, in fact, man a machine gun for 15 minutes (during which he believed he shot down a Japanese plane) and was, in fact, the first black recipient of the Navy Cross (awarded in early 1942 by Admiral Nimitz). Aside from the mistaken coffee-service bit (he was actually bagging laundry at the time) that was one of the things the producers got *right*.
Focusing on the Dolittle Raid, I saw only lost opportunities - how Dolittle convinced his superiors to let him fly, the fates of the crews (who flew solo rather than in formation and were scattered all over the place afterwards) and Dolittle's dejection at the "failed" raid and his subsequent accolades... all of this was jettisoned as the producers got out the Ritz crackers and Velveeta and went for the cheesy, contrived, convenient resolution of the *important* part of the movie, that cockamamie love triangle.
In sum, so many opportunities, so little follow through. Rent "In Harm's Way" for schmaltz, and "Tora Tora Tora" for the attack itself. Better yet, snag a copy of "At Dawn We Slept", and read up on the historical tapestry that this movie never really touched.