| Title | Operation Secret |
| Studio | Warner Brothers |
| Date of Release | November 1952 |
| Producer | Henry Blanke |
| Director | Lewis Seiler |
| Actors | Cornel Wilde, Steve Cochran, Phyllis Thaxter, Karl Malden |
| Aerial Coordinator | none |
| B-17 Filming Locations | Studio, stock combat footage |
B-17s Used
Studio Mockup; Stock combat footage
The Movie...
An early 1950s "B" movie from Warner Brothers, it's not half bad. A bit of a twisted tale of an multi-talented U.S. Marine who gets solicited to drop into Germany to verify the results of an 8th Air Force bombing raid at Schweinfurt that wraps around the French underground and the Gestapo, with a twist of romance and anti-communism thrown in. It had the thinnest framework of a link to a real story of real guy (Peter Ortiz) except all the facts are different. $1.99 rental to stream on Amazon and it might be worth 109 minutes of your time.
The B-17s? Well, it does have some stock 8th Air Force combat footage and some interiors of probably a studio-bound B-17 fuselage. I took a close look at what I could see of the B-17 interior. The three guys being dropped into Germany are huddled in what appears to be an authentic B-17 radio compartment...you can see the gun mount above them for the radio room gun, and the structure of the turtle deck going forward is visible. What is unusual is that the fuselage interior appears to be padded in the radio room. The three then move forward to the bomb bay to drop...hard to tell but it does appear to be shot looking back to the radio room from below and you can see the radio room hatch in the background. There is a cockpit view also...not too B-17 looking but it is hard to tell. The cushion behind the pilot is marked "Vega" which made me think maybe a Ventura cockpit but it's too hard to tell. It is of interest to me if it is an actualy B-17 fuselage section used only because it was 1952 and it was shot at Warner Brothers. I thought also maybe a VB-17G was used to shoot that scene but the gun mount then does not make sense. Nonetheless, a small footnote in the world of B-17s in a Hollywood effort.
Of actual more interest to me is the surprising appearance of a pair of P-51As (maybe A-36s...they are definitely Allison powered but I'm not one of those Mustang guys) dressed up as Luftwaffe fighters. They used P-51Ds as Luftwaffe fighters a few years earlier (Fighter Squadron from the CA ANG) but I suspect this is stock footage shot for some wartime production effort. A closer view of one of the Mustangs shows the pilot pretty clearly...not sure he is a military pilot from the way he is dressed. Perhaps one of the smart Mustang or movie people can add some expertise.
Anecdotal
- Waiting, waiting...
Buy or Rent this Movie!
Links
Acknowledgements
- William Villani passed along information about the B-17 involvement in this film.
On the face of it, this does look like an actual B-17 interior though the top turret is not installed. Note that the forward bomb bay bulkhead (station 4) has the top part curved as expected and the bomb racks have the expected angle. The radio room hatch is above as is the turtle deck structure moving forward. The padded walls of the radio room look non-standard, thus the mystery.
A scene shot before the last guy parachutes looking back and up...you can see the detail of the radio room hatch.
Not enough of the cockpit can be seen to accurately assess, at least for me. The cushion behind the pilot does have "Vega" amongst the other marking suggesting a Vega-built B-17 (or cushion), or PV-1, or PV-2 cockpit. Could be a B-17 but usually such scenes are shot from the left side using the standard studio cutaways. Ah, yet another mystery that nobody should really care about too much.
The wider shot of the two Allison-powered Mustangs...either P-51A or A-36, me thinks. I am guessing this was in the Warner Brothers film library and was just too good an opportunity to pass up...confuse those guys looking at it seventy years later, why dontcha.
A tighter shot of the closest Mustang...looks civilian to me but that's just me.