I came here to mention this one! One of my favorite movies set in what was then, to me, contemporary time. I saw it in the theater, and have the VHS, now DVD tape of it.
I’ll take “Things old people say” for $200, Alex.
The Battle of Midway.
Hey, I’m an old fart, what can I say?
Away all Boats. Jeff Chandler movie.
The Bridges at Toko-Ri. William Holden
That was the first movie I thought of. I caught it on TV about a year ago and was surprised when they used Mercury Fulminate for a prank. (Fulminated Mercury being part of a much larger..um..‘prank’ in Breaking Bad).
Some of my choices (especially the good ones) have already been taken, so pardon the triviality of my list.
Ice Station Zebra
Abbott and Costello in the Navy
Tora, Tora, Tora (at least partly on US ships in the harbor.) Ditto Pearl Harbor
*USS Salem * was used to play the * Graf Spee * in the British film “The Battle of the River Plate”, US title "Pursuit of the Graf Spee "
Below - set aboard a US sub in WWII.
Ensign Pulver, 1964, shown today on TCM. Has a dance scene so overtly homoerotic that my wife and I could not believe that there were people in the audience that didn’t understand this. The trailer linked-to above, at 2:21-2:25 has (I’m pretty sure) a full-on man-on-man kiss.
Starring Robert Walker and Robert Matthau. Jack Nicholson is also in this movie.
I think you mean Walter Matthau. Also Burl Ives as the biggest asshole in the US Navy; he gives a great performance here.
Although it’s not listed on the location list for Tears of the Sun, the aircraft carrier scenes at the beginning of the film were shot onboard the USS Harry S. Truman CVN-75. We changed our deployment workup schedule for a couple of days to bring the cast and crew onto the ship for a few days, and the ‘evacuated embassy personnel’ are really crewmembers of the ship. If I catch the beginning of the movie on TV some times, I’ll watch the first few minutes to see some old friends.
Totally overshadowed by Jimmy Cagney’s work in the same role in Mister Roberts.
Surprisingly good. I streamed this a few weeks ago because I like WWII movies and had never heard of it. I saw it had James Garner in it so I figured it’d be good for a laugh.
Hoo boy, was I wrong. That’s a well done, tense movie with both good character arcs on several people Garner gives a great performance against his normal routine.
It was called the USS Enterprise, but it was really filmed onboard the USS Ranger, a non-nuclear powered aircraft carrier that was still in commission at the time of the filming.
It belonged to the US Navy by the end of the movie. 
A co-worker of mine was serving on the *USS Nimitz *at the time that movie was made, and like many of his crewmates, he appeared briefly in a few scenes. He gets to snap to attention when Kirk Douglas enters the room, and someone shouts “Officer on Deck!”
He says he had one “Big Scene” in which the ship is passing through the time warp, and he was supposed to be writhing around the floor in pain… but that was left on the cutting room floor.
His name actually is in the credits… misspelled.
Just saw a trailer on TV for an upcoming series: The Last Ship
Heh. Might be interesting. Could stink on ice.