# Movies where pilots change planes mid-flight **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [April 2, 2013, 3:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592 "2013-04-02T03:29:38Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 12\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![silenus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/silenus/32/166_2.png) [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 3:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/41 "2013-04-03T15:22:13Z")
Just one more thing to spend my money on when I hit the lottery jackpot. The one off Mission Beach would look great in the front yard. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 3:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/42 "2013-04-03T15:32:50Z")
> [@silenus](#): > > Just one more thing to spend my money on when I hit the lottery jackpot. The one off Mission Beach would look great in the front yard. 😃 If you’ll settle for a [Brewster Buffalo](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brewster_F2A_Buffalo), I think this one would make a lovely addition to any yard. I think putting it up on a few cinderblocks would be a nice touch. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 5:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/43 "2013-04-03T17:02:03Z")
Answering a bit late here, but the Korean War fighter squadron in _Jet Attack_ had planes that could morph from F-84’s to F-86’s and back, including during rollout. Is there any WW2 carrier film that _doesn’t_ have that clip of the F6F collapsing a gear on landing, smacking the island, and breaking in half behind the cockpit? ---
**Author:** ![Boyo\_Jim](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/87869e/32.png) [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 5:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/44 "2013-04-03T17:20:16Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > … Is there any WW2 carrier film that _doesn’t_ have that clip of the F6F collapsing a gear on landing, smacking the island, and breaking in half behind the cockpit? I dunno, but _Flat Top_ has that shot. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 6:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/45 "2013-04-03T18:01:04Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#): > > As far as movies that got it right, IIRC _Twelve O’clock High_ did a good job. Of course it was also one of the ones with easier choices, just showing scenes of B-17s cruising along with German fighters swooping in. Unfortunately, the German fighters were P-47s a lot of the time. The scene where a whole squadron of them peels off and dives in to attack has been repeated _ad nauseam_, not just in the movies but in TV shows like _12 O’Clock High._ I remember in one episode of _Combat!_, the GIs were strafed by a P-51B painted to look like a Bf-109, complete with a backward swastika on its tail. Mercifully, I think they used that footage only once. ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 6:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/46 "2013-04-03T18:31:43Z")
That P-51 with a swastika was in more than one episode of _Twelve O’Clock High_, too. In Korean War flicks (back to those again, maybe because American International Pictures had no money?), every single MiG-15 looked just like an F-84, too. ---
**Author:** ![detop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/bcef8e/32.png) [@detop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/detop)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 6:37pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/47 "2013-04-03T18:37:43Z")
> [@terentii](#): > > Unfortunately, the German fighters were P-47s a lot of the time. The scene where a whole squadron of them peels off and dives in to attack has been repeated _ad nauseam_, not just in the movies but in TV shows like _12 O’Clock High._ > > I remember in one episode of _Combat!_, the GIs were strafed by a P-51B painted to look like a Bf-109, complete with a backward swastika on its tail. Mercifully, I think they used that footage only once. Meh ! In _Captain of the Clouds_, at the climax, when Jimmy Cagney gives his life wgile ferrying Hudsons to England, the flight his attacked by a single German plane. However anyone knowledgeable about planes will recognize the plane as a Hawker Hurricane in German markings. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/48 "2013-04-03T19:36:26Z")
I’ve been trying to think of instances where actual airplanes were used correctly in a war flick. In _The Desert Fox_, I’m pretty sure James Mason as Rommel was strafed by a real RAF Typhoon. In _The Train_, Burt Lancaster and crew are strafed by a real Spitfire. In _Von Ryan’s Express_, they’re fired on by real Bf108s, which were trainers but could conceivably have been used in the light attack role. In _Saving Private Ryan_, 9th AF P-51Ds could have been used as tank busters in Normandy. In _The Battle of Britain_, the German fighters and bombers were, I think, all real but on loan from the Spanish air force, which was still using them in 1969 (and the 109s were clearly post-war models). On the other hand… In the aforesaid _Flying Leathernecks_, Grumman F4Fs or F6Fs were painted with hinomarus to represent Japanese Zeros. In one episode of _Hogan’s Heroes_, they steal a German general’s private plane to bomb a factory. IIRC, they had actually managed to find footage of a German He177 _Greif_, which astonished me, but it was hideously interspliced with film of a B-29 and I don’t remember what else.\* \*Of course, the whole sequence was processed with a night filter, so no one ( **ahem!** ) could possibly have noticed the discrepancies. :rolleyes: ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/49 "2013-04-03T19:45:39Z")
Also, in _The Great Escape_, Hendley and Blythe correctly steal a Bf108 to fly to Switzerland, but the other planes parked at the airfield are all AT-6es painted in German markings. That incident very nearly happened, BTW, but the two escapees who were trying to crank the airplane to start it were challenged by a guard and couldn’t speak German. (This is according to Paul Brickhill’s book _The Great Escape._) ---
**Author:** ![ElvisL1ves](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@ElvisL1ves](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ElvisL1ves)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 8:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/50 "2013-04-03T20:05:02Z")
_Waiting for Dublin_ is worth a watch - the American and British pilots are sharing a T-6, in which they somehow have 4 combat kills, when they get lost and interned in Ireland, along with a defecting German pilot in his P-40. The German pilot agrees to let himself get shot down so our intrepid hero can be an ace and win his bet with Al Capone. A crossbow bolt into the German P-40’s oil line does the trick. ---
**Author:** ![Battle\_Pope](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/4bbf92/32.png) [@Battle\_Pope](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Battle_Pope)\ **Post date:** [April 3, 2013, 9:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/51 "2013-04-03T21:12:46Z")
> [@ElvisL1ves](#): > > That P-51 with a swastika was in more than one episode of _Twelve O’Clock High_, too. > > In Korean War flicks (back to those again, maybe because American International Pictures had no money?), every single MiG-15 looked just like an F-84, too. _The McConnell Story_ has grey-painted F-84F Thunderstreaks standing in for MiG-15’s. To the producers credit the F-86’s look fantastic in their 51st FIW livery. When I saw _The Incredibles_ I was impressed with the script during the sequence that the aircraft is under attack. Sure enouch according to IMDB > [@](#): > > Helen’s use of radio protocol while flying is exceptionally accurate for a movie. In the director’s commentary Brad Bird tells that Holly Hunter insisted on learning the lingo and its meaning. The terminology used hints that Elastigirl has had military flight training. > > “VFR on top” means she is flying in the regime of Visual Flight Rules ‘on top’ of a cloud cover. > She requests “vectors to the initial”, directions how to get to the initial landing approach. > “Angels 10” is her altitude call, ten thousand feet. This is a military term. Civilian flights use the term “flight level”. > “Track east” is her direction of travel. > “Buddy spike(d)” is a US military brevity code meaning “friendly anti-aircraft radar has locked on to me, (please don’t shoot)”. > “Transmitting in the Blind Guard” is a call on the emergency frequency where 2-way communication has not been established. > “Abort” is also a military brevity code, a directive meaning “stop the action/mission/attack”. ---
**Author:** ![terentii](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/terentii/32/212_2.png) [@terentii](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/terentii)\ **Post date:** [April 7, 2013, 3:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592/52 "2013-04-07T03:08:27Z")
Remembered that _The Train_ also had real Douglas A-26 Invaders flying over the trainyard while the Germans were trying to remove the white paint on the tops of the boxcars. The planes were probably supplied by the French air force, which (I would assume) was still using them in 1964. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/movies-where-pilots-change-planes-mid-flight/654592.md?page=2)