Above and Beyond (film)
| Above and Beyond | |
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Theatrical release poster
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| Directed by |
Melvin Frank Norman Panama |
| Produced by | Melvin Frank Norman Panama |
| Written by |
Beirne Lay, Jr. Melvin Frank Norman Panama |
| Starring |
Robert Taylor Eleanor Parker James Whitmore |
| Music by | Hugo Friedhofer |
| Cinematography | Ray June |
| Edited by | Cotton Warburton |
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Production
company |
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| Distributed by | Loew's Inc. |
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Release date
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Running time
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122 minutes |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Budget | $1,397,000 |
| Box office | $3,980,000 |
Above and Beyond is a 1952 American war film about Lt. Col. Paul W. Tibbets, Jr., the pilot of the aircraft that dropped the atomic bomb on Hiroshima in August 1945.
It stars Robert Taylor as Tibbets and features a love story with Eleanor Parker as his wife. James Whitmore plays security officer Major Bill Uanna. The story of the dropping of the atomic bomb is treated as a docudrama with an effort to recreate the training and operational aspects of the military units involved in the Hiroshima mission.
Col. Paul W. Tibbets, Jr. (Robert Taylor) is assigned to a dangerous mission in testing a new bomber, the Boeing B-29 Superfortress. The perilous assignment has caused his wife Lucy (Eleanor Parker) to worry for his life and whether their marriage can survive the constant separations.
After a year of scrutiny, Maj. Gen. Vernon C. Brent (Larry Keating) who not only championed Tibbets as a test pilot, selects him to lead a new unit in the Pacific war, flying the B-29, armed with a new secret weapon. Scientists of the "Manhattan Project" explain what is "the best kept secret of the war," the atomic bomb. Along with Maj. Bill Uanna (James Whitmore), the only other person who knows what the mission will entail, Tibbets is expected to keep strict discipline over the personnel assigned to a B-29 conversion unit at Wendover Field, Utah.
When families of crew members are brought to Wendover, tensions erupt in the Tibbets family due to Lucy's attitude towards her husband's secrecy concerning the mission, as the decision to use the atomic bomb has been made. Flying out to the Pacific island base of Tinian, the B-29 designated for the Hiroshima bombing is named the Enola Gay. Although the mission is a success, as he wrests the aircraft around to escape the aftershock, the realization of the devastation is brought home as Tibbets sees the flash of the bomb and the subsequent atomic blast. Back on Tinian, the crew is mobbed and although a second mission is mounted, the war has been decided by the actions of the B-29 bombers. Tibbets finally returns home, flying first to Washington where he has a joyous reunion with his wife.
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Wikipedia