Well, I put it lightly because I know this place is high on PC-osity... ya gotta tread much more carefully on the FSM forums than many others.
Anyhoo, Bob said pretty much the same to me the few times we talked, and there have been other bomber guys who more or less echoed him.
'Memphis Belle' was indeed a 'turkey' as you put it, in regards to the story it attempted to tell. And, yeah, they crammed a bit too much action into that one op, but if you forget that the aircraft is named Memphis Belle, then you have a reasonably good composite of the European air war from an AAF bomber crew's perspective. Hokey and exaggerated as some of the characters may have seemed, guys like those portrayed in the film *did* exist... and I have talked to a number of them, and to a number of their comrades.
'Memphis Belle' failed miserably in telling the story of the real 'Belle'... but it succeeded in a number of other ways and is certainly more than watchable if you're able to keep that in mind.
Like I said, it was almost unwatchable... I've actually watched it more times than I can recall, each time finding some little tid-bit I liked, and hadn't noticed before (I never counted things like Buchon's, "Cheyenne tails", or faired-over chin-turrets and cheek windows)... Especially good was the part when John Lithgow's character (LTC Derringer) is reading the letters from the dead airmen's families that COL Harriman gave him, voicing over the gun-camera and mission camera footage... That really socked home some of the things the movie was after... It was a rather powerful scene..
Some of the other things I noticed though, but are more like nit-picks than problems:
The B-17 that bellied-in in the beginning had it's props "replaced" after it came to a stop. Initially, when it hit, a couple blades went flying off, but the wide shot from the side, just before it explodes, the blades are there. It also "changed noses".. It had nose-art when it came in, but it was gone in the wide-shot.
Danny, veteran with 24 missions behind him was a T-3 (equal to a Staff Sergeant), but that Cherry radio operator from "Mother and Country" was a Master Sergeant? Highly doubtful... Both his rank and age don't add up...
The P-51Ds were a little "early" for the date of the mission.. By about a year...
Val invented CPR...
One of the real B-17s' pilots is wearing a modern Telex headset w/ boom-mic druing take-off.
They got to the "Rally Point" before the bomb run.. Shoulda been the, IP- "Initial Point"... You only head for the Rally-point AFTER the bomb drop...
The Belle's ball turret was intact and postioned for landing at the end of the film.
Can't re-load the B-17's tailgun ammo cans in-flight.. They can only be loaded from outside the aircraft...So Clay's excuse to allow Luke back there wouldn't happen.
Couple that REALLY bugged me though..
The crew constantly putting on and taking off O-masks at altitude (actually bugs me in a LOT of movies. Top Gun was one like that, and another film that featured "Rascal", Courage Under Fire, LTC Searling's and crew ICS converstaions were in the radio recordings from the tank battle... Wouldn't happen, as the ICS and radio can't be used at the same time. You have to move the switch on the CVC helmet to the radio position, and then push it backwards to transmit)... Also the total lack of ICS dicispline and constant "chit-chat" over it in the plane... (I know, the actors' faces gotta be seen, and the movie would be pretty boring at times if the ICS was used properly... Still...)
There are more, but that'll do for now, lol... I don't wanna beat a dead horse...
It's great that you knew Bob Morgan.. I first met him at Midland in '97, and we managed to link up again in 98, at the American Combat Airmen's Hall of Fame induction, and again in 99... Been planning a model of Dauntless Dotty to go along with the Belle... Kinda sad that nobody knows about his tour in B-29s. Revell once had a kit of "Dotty", but it was 1/144 or maybe it was just a "Box Scale" kit, but I didn't do that scale, so it was passed on..
