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Unless you're willing to concede that the the movie was made as a farce, which I don't happen to believe, then the plot and acting are one cringeworthy moment after another, starting with Janet Leigh's improbably striptease after landing her Soviet fighter at a US airbase, not that there's anything wrong with her stripping, of course. The improbabilities pile on higher and deeper to the point that being probable is no longer even the point and you just don't care anymore.

That said, the true star of this movie is the period hardware, some of it seldom seen anywhere else. The scene of the night interception of the Convair B-36 showed an early model in flight in such detail that if you look closely you can see that the retractable weapons, usually seen retracted on this rather rare machine, are extended. Also other fighters of the era are portrayed including the Bell X-1 that fills in for the Soviet parasite fighter that is actually the rocket plane that Chuck Yeager flew on the world's first supersonic flight. If you are an aviation enthusiast I highly recommend this movie. If you are fan of The Duke or are looking for action adventure or suspense entertainment, pass this one by, it's not for you.

I don't see why so many people hated this film, i actually sort of liked it. It's much better than several other John Wayne movies like The Sea Chase and Blood Alley. This was Joseph Von Sternberg's last film and he didn't like it either. This was made in 1950 but wasn't released until 1957. It stars off with a landing on an air force base and the pilot turns out to be Janet Leigh. The air force just want to get information out of here and give John Wayne the job. Wayne falls in love with her pretty quickly but you don't know about Janet Leigh. The air force find out she's a spy and are going to deport her but John Wayne marries her first. The air force doesn't like it but decides to send John Wayne over to Russia to get information out of them. John Wayne is good as usual and Janet Leigh is very sexy in this movie, just watch the first scene in John Wayne's office, you'll see what i mean.

Cold War romance brought to you not by Kraft, makers of fine cheese, but by Howard Hughes in all his mentally ill glory. There's John Wayne doing his best John Wayne, which is always fun. We get lots of scenes of flying jets complete with a seemingly endless soundtrack of jet noises. What are jet noises? You know, that sound like on the Roadrunner cartoons when Wile E. Coyote strapped a rocket to his back. But the main reason to watch this is lovely Janet Leigh, Hughes' muse of the moment. The camera's absolutely in love with her. She made many better pictures but few quite as enjoyable for me. It's a good movie of its type, helped along by some unintended comedy and the lovely Ms. Leigh. It's the kind of movie I just like to look at even if I don't care what the actors are saying.

Howard Hughes original intension was to do another Hell's Angels for the Cold War Era. Remember that film was equally famous for the aviation shots as for the debut of Jean Harlow as sex symbol.

Well if sex and flying worked before, why not again. Hughes filmed some really great aviation footage and then worked to build a story around it, one with some sex. So he reworked the plot of Ninotchka and adapted it to the wild blue yonder.

The reason originally for the delay in release was that we were making great strides in aviation post World War II. So he re-shot and re-shot the aviation sequences and then eventually lost interest. Jet Pilot was released seven years after it was originally filmed and by then the planes really looked out of date. Our's and the Soviet's. One of the players, Richard Rober, in fact was killed in an automobile crash in 1952.

The only thing you can say about Jet Pilot is that the Russians were far in advance of us on feminist issues. Why then would you have the shapely Janet Leigh filling out a flight suit after allegedly going off course and landing in the USA?

Air Force Colonel John Wayne interrogates Janet about the latest in Soviet technology, but then he gets other things on his mind. After a while he's got the hots for her so bad, he marries her and they go back to the USSR to see what he can find out about their aircraft.

Does it sound pretty silly to you? Even for a propaganda film I doubt this one affirmed anyone's Americanism. Remember this was released on top of The Conqueror and between them they put and end to Wayne's seven year reign as number one at the box office.

By the way at the time this was being filmed, Howard Hughes was panting after Janet Leigh the same way he'd earlier panted after Ava Gardner. He got MGM to send her to RKO for three films, this, A Holiday Affair and the musical Two Tickets to Broadway. Poor Janet.

And poor everyone else connected with Jet Pilot.

I waited a long time to see this movie, now I have and I must say I found it better than I had reason to expect. It is a fast moving comedy with many really funny scenes. Could it be this was the first movie that made fun of the Cold War? Could it be it was shelved for years for that reason (maybe the war in Corea made it inopportune to laugh about such matters)? Josef von Sternberg, steeped in German Expressionism, would be the last director you'd expect to helm a movie that at first sight seems to be an older version of Top Gun. But things are set straight very soon as it becomes evident that this is supposed to be a comedy in the vein of something by Ernst Lubitsch or Billy Wilder. Ninotchka comes to mind, and in a way - a hilarious way - Janet Leigh as the (intentionally?) grounded Russian jet pilot is in the footsteps of Greta Garbo here. So John Wayne as American jet pilot is a reticent, rather shy Melvyn Douglas. In his part you'd rather expect Cary Grant, and Wayne does seem to be slightly embarrassed throughout the movie.

Vivacious Janet Leigh's physical assets are highlighted as much as possible and with great success. There is a nice striptease scene in which she gets out of her cute white overalls, and each time she starts peeling off a new layer of clothing - woooosh - a jet plane is heard diving down. It's really a hoot. Soon she reappears in the American's war room in a neatly pressed Red Army uniform, full of medals and fruit salad (she must have stashed it somewhere in that jet plane of hers). Soon she and Wayne are off to Palm Springs, so that she can see what the Commies are missing. Wayne, in turn, gets a whiff of Socialist reality later on, as he accompanies the Russien pilot he sort of married back home. It's grim and Stalag-like, of course.

There is a lot of aerial footage in Jet Pilot and it is high quality material that still fascinates. A lot of elegant acrobatics is performed and filmed from different angles. But even the jets are well embedded in the comedy this movie ultimately is. One of the scene I liked best: Janet Leigh escapes. She runs to a jet with its – er – engine already running, pushes away the ladder and dashes of as if it were a little sports car or some getaway after a heist in a gangster movie. It's unparalleled and one of many laughs Jet Pilot offers.

Unlike John Wayne's more famous movie turkey, The Conquerer, this film is so bad that it is lots of fun to watch. It is incredibly poorly written (even for an RKO picture) and makes his earlier Republic Films look like masterpieces by comparison (and a few actually were). And, combined with the terrible dialog and dopey plot is the absolute worst performance of Janet Leigh's life! She plays a Russian Airforce pilot with less conviction than perhaps any actress could have approached the role. Not once does she even give the least hint of a Russian accent, though through the use of very thick sweaters she DOES appear to be the poster girl for Playboy Magazine. This nymphet role is combined with stoic "Russian" dialog that sound like it's right out of a grade school play. It's unintentionally hilarious.

As for Wayne, he pretty much plays himself. A REALLY, REALLY horny self, that is! FYI--Apparently the Russians flew Lockheed Shooting Stars (F-80s). You see, when you stick a red star on it, it becomes the spitting image of a MIG-15. Well, that is if you squint REALLY hard and maybe get REALLY drunk first and hit yourself on the head with a frying pan, and,...

Interesting film, in that the contrast of positives and negatives is as glaringly apparent as The Grand Canyon is wide.

First, to get the negatives out of the way, the (mis)casting centers around Jay C. Flippen, a career "character actor," as John Wayne's Air Force Commanding General. John Wayne reporting to Jay C. Flippen is like Humphrey Bogart reporting to Jerry Lewis, as in "Something is amiss, here." Where the John Wayne-Jay C. Flippen seniority debacle is concerned, it makes one wonder, "Where have you gone Dean Jagger?" - who did such a credible job propping up Gregory Peck in "One O'Clock High," filmed in the same year of 1949.

It has already been noted, elsewhere here, the credibility gap of Janet Leigh lacking a hint of a Russian accent. This, of course, is the typical Howard Hughes bravado of just getting his "starlet of the year" up there on the screen, and to hell with the consequences of in-default major details undermining everything else. Ava Gardner, Jean Peters, Jane Russell, and Janet, et al, never complained, we may assume.

Some may think this is strictly an Air Force public relations-type vehicle. However, the real motivation behind this film may have been more subtle, such as putting Janet Leigh's kissy face and contour-friendly mammary gland dimensions opposite John Wayne, to propel her into the national "silver screen" luminary spotlight. And giving John and Janet multiple kissing scenes validates this theory, as John Wayne indulged in few kissing scenes with his leading ladies, over the entire span of his career. And as smiling fate would have it, Janet's career went full bore right into the 60's, complete with "Psycho" shower scene immortality, without so much as a "leg up" from this film, which was finally released in 1957 for political red red tape reasons far in excess of any political statement this film actually makes.

The most compelling question surrounding this film has to do with the V.I.P. treatment this "off course" seductive female Soviet fighter pilot receives, courtesy of the U.S. military, as John Wayne is assigned the task of escorting her on a whirlwind tour of parties, clubs and dances, ad nauseam. This begs the question: at what point does the U.S. Government come to regard her as a spy(?), which is the delayed reaction, two-thirds into the film. So that, if a cold war spy suspect is pretty, she gets a pass? Hollywood script writers are known for their apostasy when it comes to sticking to the facts, but this one is off the chart for script-writing license absurdity.

The saving grace for this film is simply that John and Janet seem a great "opposites attract" pairing, complete with a smoldering physical attraction chemistry. Janet does not seem over-matched as John's intellectual rival when it comes to social banter and as regards discussing the nuances of advanced-technology aviation. She holds her own, in fact.

Call this film entertaining and well worth seeing, so long as you don't take it too seriously. After all, those who produced it didn't make that mistake, either.

********

The aerial footage is nice, but once people start talking, the film goes into a tailspin. The plot seems as though it was made up as they went along (on a few occasions, I thought a reel must be missing) and I don't think I'm giving anything away (like there was any suspense anyway) by saying John Wayne must really love Janet Leigh to stay with her after she pistol whips him. Twice. It's unintentionally hilarious but unbelievably bad. I always like Hans Conreid, but he doesn't show up until the very end. All of the other actors in the film have a wooden presentation, as though they brought in actual air force officers to appear in the film. And if the U.S. military really hatched a plan like this, there should be courts martial all around.

So-so film was held up for 7 years , before being finally released , being spoiled by an absurd story , though saved only by the impressive flying scenes . It deals with Air Force Col. Jim Shannon (John Wayne) is tasked to escort a defecting Soviet pilot Lt. Anna Marladovna Shannon / Olga Orlief (cute-pie spy played by attractive Janet Leigh) who is scheming to lure Shannon to the USSR . Maj. Gen. Black (Jay C. Flippen) and Maj. Rexford (Paul Fix) assign Shannon to survey Anna , but things go wrong . Later on , they marry , but our protagonist suspects she is a spy planted to find out US secrets . Then Shannon pretends defect with her back to Russia to watch what he can find out , but they again flee .

This romantic comedy packs thrills , one-dimensional heroics , comic-strip dialogue , spy-game , ludicrous screenplay and a lot of sky-shattering scenes that are flashily breathtaking . Intimate as well as spectacular WWI airplane movie with an agreeable cast , overwhelming aerial scenes , though including a silly romance . It is one of the Greatest Air Spectacle of the Jet Age but it has a ridiculous plot that relies heavily on an ridiculous love story . This is an entertaining as well as showy Dramedy about relationship between two pilots as well as a tough commanding officer determined to improve efficiency , interwoven with nice aerial footage ; it was so big it took years to make with an inestimable help from the US Air Force , still taking advantage of Chuck Yeager's 1947 supersonic flight for publicity , offered his services as a stunt pilot . This was apparently one of the first films in which the US Air Force during the Cold War was featured , including spectacular aircrafts , such as : first Bell X-1 , Glamorous Glennis , Boeing EB-50A Superfortress , serial 46-0007 ,B-36 , F-94 Starfire F-80 Shooting Star , prototype Northrop XP-89 Scorpion ,Lockheed T-33As , B-36B by a Lockheed F-94A Starfire , among others . It appeared in a number of films afterward , notably Bombers B-52 (1957) , A gathering of eagles (1963) , Dr. Strangelove: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb (1964), and By Dawn's Early Light . Amiable acting by John Wayne , in real life a staunch anti-communist, who shambles through the action with a permanent sympathetic grin , he plays a jet pilot in charge of Alaskian Air Force base who falls in love with a defecting pilot , a gorgeous Janet Leigh . Support cast is frankly excellent , such as Jay C. Flippen , Paul Fix , Richard Rober , Hans Conried and brief appearances by Bill Erwin , James Brown , Mamie Van Doren , Kenneth Tobey and Denver Pyle .

Brilliant cinematography in Cinemascope and Technicolor by Winton Hoch , John Ford 's usual cameraman , shot on location , the filming for the Russian air base was done at George Air Force Base, a World War II air base with many of its wartime structures still intact, giving the base a primitive appearance . Thrilling as well as rousing musical score by Bronislau Kaper . The film was produced by RKO in 1950 which was owned by Howard Hughes, although this was shot in the fifties , it took seven more years to be released because Hughes couldn't keep his hands off it . As he intended to show off the latest in aircraft technology in 1950 , when this film was shot . By the time it was released to the public, in 1957 , the aircraft featured were already obsolete . The picture was regularly directed by Josef Von Sternberg . His commercial breakthrough was Underworld (1927), a prototypical Hollywood gangster film . With The Last Command (1928), starring the equally strong-willed Emil Jannings , von Sternberg began a period of almost a decade as one of the most celebrated artists of world cinema . Both his film career and his personal life were transformed in the making of Blue Angel (1930). Chosen by Jannings and producer Erich Pommer to make Germany's first major sound picture, Von Sternberg gambled by casting Marlene Dietrich . Josef , subsequently , directed her in various prestigious pictures as Dishonored , The Devil Is a Woman , Blonde Venus , The Scarlet Empress and the greats hit : Shanghai Express ; being Jet pilot his last film .

This was filmed in 1950, and not released until 1957 due to producer Howard Hughes dissatisfaction with the finished film. He tinkered with various scenes for seven years, until the new aircraft he had wanted to showcase in 1950 was outdated by the time of the film's release. Scripted by Jules Furthman, it plays like a airborne remake of "Ninotchka" (1939) and 1950 anti-Communist philosophizing.

John Wayne plays Col. Jim Shannon of the Air Force. He and his squadron spot a Russian plane, flown by Olga (Janet Leigh). After getting her plane to land at the Air Force base, and questioning her, he falls in love with her. After courting her at the Pentagon's behest, so she will let information about Russia slip, he finds out she's a spy. The plot then goes into comic book territory, and loses all credibility and interest.

The script is the main problem. It changes tone from scene to scene, veering from far-fetched melodrama to crude comedy and back. Wayne plays his persona, not his character. Leigh goes from being brainy to being a "dumb blonde", with no explanation. The two do the best they can to be amusing.

I can barely tell von Sternberg directed the movie. The only sign of him is the many loving closeups Leigh is given. Winton C. Hoch directed the beautiful cinematography. Bronislau Kaper's score is much more amusing than the script.

This may be of interest to aviation buffs, and Wayne/Leigh/von Sternberg completists. All others beware.

At the ripe old age of 50, I was amazed to see JET PILOT today for the very first time. Not many Wayne films have escaped me, but this one had. As I was watching the film, it occurred to me that ol Duke must have enjoyed being a fighter pilot (as he should) because he played a pilot in at least 6 films I could think of off the top of my head. Janet Leigh was not overly convincing as a Soviet, but WOW is she gorgeous... WHO CARES. Still, if she had a convincing Russian accent and some leather this would have been the Duke's best effort! Great film of some wonderful machines, and such a treat to see them as well. I became a fighter pilot because of the F-86 though I was too old to fly one... this film features them constantly. Chuck Yeager stunted for the film and broke a tail in a Sabre pressing the envelope. Overall, just a nice film, that was totally unlike any Wayne film I had ever seen. Normally, you know exactly how the plot will go, and that Good, Truth, and the American Way will prevail... but this one... actually makes you wonder if that is going to be the case?!?! Maybe not for the Duke, you know he has a trick up his sleeve, but Janet Leigh?? She is a wild card and you never know till the end who will win out. This movie was akin to finding a $20 bill in your pocket from last year... it has been there a long time, and just a nice treat to come across it.

I personally disagree with the ones that say that this is bad in the same way as ''The Conqueror''. Sure it's bad, but it more looked a comedy than a war movie.

John Wayne plays a US Air Force Colonel that is forced to escort a defecting soviet pilot (Janet Leigh) to Russia, and then all hell breaks loose, and in a funny way. Wayne and Leigh even fall in love, and they share even some nights out. Even when they end in Russia the comedy comes out of nowhere! Paul Fix is the comic relief while Hans Conried did his best with the material he was given.

However there was a good thing about this movie (that's why I rated it 7); the nice figther planes and the aerial shots, very ahead of its time (made in 1951, but not released until 1957).

There is great colour footage of F-86, F-80, B-36 and Bell X aircraft here interspersed with utterly ridiculous lines and a bizarre plot. Typically paper thin film making from Howard Hughes with big stars, high production values and zero aspiration towards making a decent movie. How some reviewers can say Wayne acts well in this film beats me! Janet Leigh is gorgeous though...

As ludicrous as the narrative and dramatics are, this movie has some of the best, even wonderful, jet-age aerial scenes ever filmed. All in color, too!

Forget the story, discard any literary seriousness..., for genuine vintage military aircraft buffs, the flight footage alone is more than worth the price. Also has great shots of aircraft on the ground. It's like a historical (occassionally hysterical) air museum in motion.

The fact that it avoided grainy/phony stock shots, that the aerial footage was shot especially for this movie, that Chuck Yeager performed much of the stunt flying, and that there is actual original footage of the Bell X-1 in flight, makes this movie a true gem for military aviation buffs.

For Paul Frees fans, his brief appearance is incredibly energetic.

Oddly, the DVD is letterboxed, but the 1950 production (with a delayed 1957 release) was shot before the widescreen era, and should have been uncropped full-screen on video.

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If you want to see classic US jetfighters in action, this is a great flick. However, dramatically, it takes big cinematic license that an apparent WWII veteran and Korean War vet, (Wayne)would be wordly enough to embrace a Russian Communist officer romantically (Leigh). Remember, in this McCarthy era, that would have been a USAF career killer.

My wife agrees that even though he's about thirty years her senior in the pic, Janet Leigh would still fall for the big guy. It sure looks like the Duke is having a good time in the movie, which is very tongue-in-cheek.

One little distraction among many historical inaccuracies, this is supposedly 1957 and in the colorized (?)version I saw recently o n AMC, it looks like Wayne is wearing a USAAF uniform. Also, the fighters in the movie seem to have an inexhaustable supply of fuel and oxygen.

Nevertheless, Janet Leigh is delicious in the role.

Overall, a fun airplane picture and I recommend it as a great Saturday afternoon distraction. And it does accurately portray the fact women are more than equal to the task of combat flying--an idea way ahead of its time in 1957 (but perhaps not for Russia who had a number of women pilots in WWII combat roles).

I have to say from the start that I still have a soft spot for Janet Leigh because, being introduced to movies as a small boy in the early 1950's with pictures like Houdini, The Black Shield Of Falworth, Safari and the like, Janet has stuck in my mind ever since as the glamorous, beautiful leading lady that she was. A fine actress, much better than most of her generation, she exuded warmth with a stunning face and figure only matched by actresses like Marilyn Monroe, Grace Kelly and Ava Gardner.

Here, Janet is co-starred with the mighty John Wayne and together they bounce of one another literally, in a fun, very silly story about a Russian jet pilot (Leigh) going off course and landing in the States, only to be interrogated by Wayne, an army general.

This picture was famously a Howard Hughes project that he continuously shelved, being shot in 1950 when Janet was 23 and Wayne 43, but not released until 1957. The jets, although very well photographed do look a little old, even to my untrained eye. These aerial scenes actually look pretty good and help boost my rating. It's the script though that is ropey. Janet is supposed to be a Russian but makes no attempt to disguise her natural American voice and Wayne just looks bemused throughout the entire film. They do have great chemistry though, which works so well here. At times I thought Wayne looked genuinely quite taken with his young co-star. My overall impression is that it's just a rom/com and full of fun so best leave it at that. Nicely entertaining.

Stretch the limits of credibility in a military espionage/romance. Now stretch them some more. More. M-o-r-e.

Now you have the "story" (if it can be dignified with that term) of "Jet Pilot". It is hard to imagine that the movie-making craft had already been around over half a century when a story as preposterous as this was committed to celluloid.

The only thing that compares to the silliness of the plot is the absolutely abysmal casting of the leads. Two short planks of wood would've rendered more heat than the pairing of Wayne and Leigh. As a love story and as a military spy story, this forgettable fluff is a bomb not worth the hour and a half of anyone's time.

The spy plot in the movie is a bit weak. However, John Wayne is in prime form here, and the onscreen romance between his character and Janet Leigh's works well. It is a happy go lucky cold war love story that is enjoyable to watch. The footage of early jets in close maneuver is also worthwhile.

Josef von Sternberg and Technicolor should have been a formidable combination. But the true auteur behind this jaw-dropping folly was infamous back-seat driver Howard Hughes (who continued tinkering with the film long after Sternberg had left the production). Hence the combination of smirking titillation and breathtaking aerial photography with which he had already overwhelmed audiences twenty years earlier in 'Hell's Angels'.

The youthful Janet Leigh (who disliked Sternberg but later grudgingly acknowledged that he was a better director than she cared to admit at the time) would later reveal her considerable talents as an actress for directors like Welles and Hitchcock. Those weren't exactly the talents that Hughes was interested in revealing; but casting her as a Russian aviator shows a certain enterprise.

Howard Hughes produced this ahead-of-its-time film in the late 1940's, but couldn't get it released until US Air Force clearance was approved in 1957. It sat on a shelf in storage for 8 years until its release. John Wayne is his usual macho self, an American flyer, ladies man, infatuated with a Russian pilot who treats him like a spy. A very young Janet Leigh is the pilot who falls in love with tough-guy Wayne and agrees to defect to the US as his wife.

The special effects in this film are quite convincing in spite of its age. Of course, the US Air Force helped everywhere needed to make the picture seem real. Thought that the idea of a female Russian pilot was interesting since the movie was made long before women's lib.

John Wayne and Janet Leigh are especially good together as are the usual cast of colorful characters who help pad out the storyline. This is one of my favorite John Wayne pictures. He is surprisingly natural in his performance with a light touch of good humor thrown in for good measure. Most any John Wayne fan would enjoy this film heartily.

Sincerely it was another John Wayne's attempts to expose that him wasn't a western's actor only, another flop indeed, the plot is too unbelievable and weak to take it seriously, why they took it ahead, most probable by the Duke's background on box-office, the flying scenes is too contrived, they seems made a contest on so fastest bold flights, how they running to URSS and how they go back is ridiculous, but worth to see Janet Leigh at undressing sequence, to soap in their eyes asking for Wayne helps is enough to me, Jay C. Flippen has a convincing acting, also the inseparable Wayne's pal Paul Fix, an average American movie propaganda against the reds !!!

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First watch: 2010 / How many: 2 / Source: DVD / Rating: 7