This, along with "Twelve O'clock High", has got to be one of the absolute best movies ever made dealing with the 8th Air Force in World War Two. Taken from William Wister Haines novel and Broadway Play, the movie is actually better than both, given the constraints of the time regarding profanity, as the stage play and novel are loaded with then-taboo words. Clark Gable's portrayal of Brig. General K.C. Dennis is outstanding in a cast of excellent actors. Van Johnson, as his aide, T/Sgt. Evens, comes to stealing the show with some of his expressions. Haines, who was on the staff of the United States Strategic Air Forces in London during the war, draws from his own experience of the AAF command and the strategic and political thinking that went into some of the air strikes against strategic targets in Germany, from the value of the targets to the implications and consequences of letting political agendas at home take precedence over military considerations in the selection of targets, as Walter Pidgeon's portrayal of Maj. General Kane, Dennis' superior, shows all too well. He has sold out his ideals for air power to keep his job, and demands picking easy targets with low losses that will both keep a visiting Congressional Committee happy, and satisfy the US Navy. And Charles Bickford, as cynical, hard-bitten reporter War Correspondent Elmer Brockhurst, shrewdly and sarcastically asks during a Kane diatribe about getting funds and resources from Congress and the Navy "Where did I get the idea this war was against the Axis?" To me, another added plus in this film is that most of the principal cast were veterans of WW2, and Gable was a Captain with the 8th AF in England, who actually flew on some of these combat mission. Overall, and this really is a tough call to make, I'd have to say that I rate this movie just a tad higher then "Twelve O'Clock High", but whenever I watch them, I always make it a double bill.
Review of Command Decision
