Da plane! Da plane!

Island in the Sky (1953)
John Wayne - Dooley

This film came to DVD only a few years ago. Back when I managed a movie store, old guys would come in from time to time and ask for this one, The High and the Might, and Ice Station Zebra. The first two are John Wayne films, and the last one is a Rock Hudson flick. All are on my list to watch. When I finally got word that these three films were being released, and it completely freaked me out that they were released the same day, I told all the old regulars. I sold out of all three in a few hours. All of them bought The High and the Mighty and Ice Station Zebra, and most bought Island in the Sky. I've been interested in watching all three ever since.

As you can see from the title, the first one up is Island in the Sky. This is one of the lesser known John Wayne movies. Taking place right after WWII, John Wayne and others play pilots who had been drafted to fly in combat, but are now mostly commercial pilots. John Wayne's crew gets lost in Canada due to issues with the compass and cloud coverage, and end up crashing somewhere in the mountains in the dead of winter. The rest of the film switches back and forth between Wayne trying to keep his crew alive and sane, and the rescue team desperately trying to track the missing crew down before it's too late.

Here's my experience watching it:

Wow. There is a commercial at the beginning promoting a ton of John Wayne films finally on DVD. I so want to have a John Wayne marathon. Must. Resist.

I think Leonard Maltin is bit of a putz. He clearly loves films, but his review of every film might as well be nothing but, “OMG THIS MOVIE IS TEH BEST EVR!" Still, his introductions are fairly informative. He let me know to be on the look out for a lot of actors who aren't in the credits.

Wow. John Wayne, James Arness, Fess Parker and the dude that played Alfalfa. It’s like half of my childhood together in one film. Too bad Fess Parker is as dull as a doornail.

It’s sad watching John Wayne smoke knowing how he died. And it’s just weird to be reminded how everybody smoked in movies back then.

The crash landing was pretty intense for a film made in 1953.

Wow, some of these guys I recognize from a ton of old films. Regis Toomey was in Spellbound and The Bishop’s Wife. Paul Fix was the judge in To Kill a Mockingbird, though I will always remember him as the grandfather of The Bad Seed. Then there’s Harry Carey, Jr, a man well-known to those that watch old westerns. More modern movie audiences might recognize him as the Tombstone marshal in Kurt Russell’s pretty awesome western made in 1993.

Some guy is on the screen wearing a fantastic fake beard.

This film tries something I don’t recall ever seeing in a John Wayne move: a voice over. This may have not been the best choice. The voice, the director’s, works for many parts. Unfortunately, the camera is often focused for long moments on a silent Wayne attempting to emote his internal dialogue. Let’s just say John Wayne is perhaps not the best actor in the world.

Even without the trademark camera angles from Gunsmoke that made him seem as tall as the Jolly Green Giant, James Arness still looks like one tall mofo. And can you believe he’s still alive? Woah.

I didn’t know the YMCA even existed back then.

OMG It’s the dude who did the voice of Friar Tuck in the animated Robin Hood! I recognized that voice immediately. Honestly, I’m not sure what he said through much of the film. I couldn’t listen to him without descending into giggles. It also didn’t help that he even looks a bit like Friar Tuck.

Who knew Wheaties cereal was around before 1953? Not me.

There are a few completely ridiculous moments in this film. For instance, “The ammunition is frozen.” LOL

I looked up at one point and noticed that I still had 45 minutes ago. I was stumped to come up with anything left to show that could take that long.

It is sad that one of the guys died, but my husband and I couldn’t help laughing during is final moments. He died walking in circles in a blizzard, ending up collapsing right next to the plane, the rest of the crew not far away screaming his name in unison like morons. The execution was so bad it made the entire scene comical.

In this film, there are four crews. One has John Wayne, one has James Arness, one has Alfalfa and one has Friar Tuck. James Arness plays perhaps the funniest character in the film, which really freaked me out. I’ve always thought of him as a serious badass. Alfalfa is a co-pilot for a really boring crew. Friar Tuck is great just to listen to, single-handedly making his crew full of win. And John Wayne’s crew spends half its time falling apart while waiting to be rescued. That was pretty depressing.

Did you know that Canada is a dangerous area to fly over? It turns out the only reason they can’t find the survivors is because there’s something abut Montreal that messes with their compasses. Apparently it takes God to see you safely through. Those Canadians must be the most religious people on the face of the planet.

John Wayne is freakin’ awesome when he gets all violent, yelling at his charges. On the other hand, he shows more remorse and sadness in this film than perhaps all his others combined. It’s kinda depressing to see him look like he’s going to cry.

As you may have guessed from my previous gushing about all the actors I recognized, acting talent was not exactly a, shall we say, prerequisite for being cast in this film. It was never what drove people to see John Wayne. Despite this, one actor stands out as having real talent: Lloyd Nolan. Most people don’t know this guy, he was more of a character actor. I only know about him because I am a huge fan of Murder, She Wrote. His last performance was an episode of that show, after which he promptly died. I was so struck by the morbidity of that, I immediately tried to find out what his other work was. Unfortunately, I haven’t seen most of it. It’s too bad he wasn’t cast in more high profile films.

There is a great exchange at the very end of the film. When the rescue planes fly over the survivors, they drop bags of supplies and other items. One of those items is a letter informing all the guys about how their families are doing back home. The guy reading the letter tells Dooley that his wife and six kids are fine. One of the other crew members turns to Dooley and says, “Hey, I didn’t know you had a wife and kids.” Wayne’s response is, “Yeah.” And then the movie ends. My response is, “WTF? You have a family?” Well, actually, my first response was, “Does that 'yeah' mean you have six wives or six kids." My humor is pretty sad sometimes. But seriously, he had a family? WTF?

Overall, I can see why it took so long for this to be released for purchase. Though I had heard that part of it was due to the Wayne estate trying to hold it back, it isn’t even close to being one of John Wayne’s best films. It isn’t even that close to being a good film. If anyone wants to see a good John Wayne movie that features planes, watch The Flying Leathernecks; even today that one holds up. The only thing that got me through was that, unlike with most older films, I can forgive bad plots in John Wayne and James Stewart films. I like those two so much I will even watch their bad films. I enjoyed watching it (husband didn't like it), and I suspect that most John Wayne fans, or fans of the old 40s and 50s action movies, would like it as well. Still, I think I will be sending this one to dad for Christmas. I know he'll love it.