Movie of the Week 42

Midway   2019   war action adventure

This is an epic movie about the time in June 1942 when the Japanese Imperial Navy (JIN) sailed to Midway Island looking for a fight, and expecting another Pearl Harbor surprise attack. Instead, the JIN fleet was hammered by waves of American bombers, torpedo planes and dive bombers. The surface fleets did not engage; the battle was settled by airpower and marked a turning point in the war, as well as, a transition in naval doctrine in favor of larger and larger aircraft carriers. To understand the background and more details about this military history topic read my 2017 article, “Kitty Hawk to Midway: The Genesis of the Modern Aircraft Carrier Era”. 

Back to the movie, the trick to making quality Historical Docu-Dramas is trying to balance Historical relevance with Historical accuracy and all the while have believable characters and dialogue that present a good story. The artistic cast and movie makers of “Midway” did just that, and produced one of the best war movies in decades. The success of this film did not (could not) depend on one big star; this historical topic is a bit more complicated with plenty of dynamic, moving parts so the director used one of the best ensemble casts ever that did not depend on one power actor to propel all the key scenes. And let’s not forget the war birds – the American Dauntless Dive Bombers and Japanese Zeros are star-worthy, too. 
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This movie is ridiculously underrated with a Tomatometer score of 44, indicating a mediocre effort. Film critic Max West invented the term “mind gap” to describe the often deep chasm between the paying audience and the media movie critics. The “Mind Gap” of Midway is astonishing. See snapshot from Rotten Tomatoes below. 

If you read the actual reviews, there emerges a particularly harsh tone from several of the Woke-type feminist film critics. Writes Wendy “Windbag” Ide of the Guardian, “All the most enormous, jutting, chiseled chins in Hollywood are called up to do their duty, and armed with lines of dialogue that sink like depth charges… Every tired war movie cliché is unearthed in a film that brings nothing new but will no doubt please fans of men in uniform.” Post-modern fem-Nazis, like Wendy, love the modern style of movie casting that reject white males and replace same by a collection of female heroines, no matter how fake it comes off. I am sure Wendy would have no problem casting Whoopi Goldberg as Fleet Admiral Chester Nimitz to “bring something new” whatever the fuck that means. So back to reality, in this case, we have a war story firmly rooted in the real world of the 1940’s, together with a skilled director that stays true to his art and time period accuracy. In real life, and in the movie, the main characters are American or Japanese males. As expected the film is biased in favor of the Americans (DUH!) and quite a bit of screen time is filled by the American carrier pilots, who are two-fisted, masculine heroes, brimming with strength, mastery, honor, and camaraderie. No wonder the anti-male feminists hate this film and thereby, reveal their ignorance about Artistic Integrity.
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Finally here is a new WW2 movie with the right balance of high-tech effects, good storytelling, tension and remarkable historical gravitas. I highly recommend seeing this production on the largest screen you can find. All of us Patriots need to support “Midway” and help make it a big success.

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