Victory Through Air Power

A Disney Tale:  The wonder of aviation is examined through its importance in winning the Second World War.

Disney Hero: USA! USA! USA!  Oh my word, this is Disney as propaganda maxed up to 200%.  It's the USA who realised how important air power was to the war effort; it's the USA who spent time and money developing better planes; it's the USA who single handedly won the Second World War!  The USA, and specifically the pioneers of aviation and military air forces, are the heroes of this bizarre Disney film.

Disney Heroine: With it's focus on aviation and war, there are very few women depicted in the film (to be honest, there aren't actually that many men either).  There are certainly no women shown as being part of the war effort.

Disney Villain: The Nazis!  Germans.  Fritz.  In one scene, depicting a dog fight in WW1, a french man, named Pierre battles a German called Fritz.  As the film progresses to WW2, the Germans and, latterly, the Japanese are the clear villains of the conflict.  But in actual fact, these villains are portrayed as abstractly as the heroes.  It's planes, battleships and tanks across maps of countries, rather than individual soldiers, pilots and sailors.


Disney Magic: This is a film sorely lacking in Disney magic.  This is not a film for children.  This is not even really a fan for Disney films.  It is propaganda through and through, masquerading as an educational film. In fact, the latter 15 minutes of the film are incredibly violent with bombs being dropped left, right and centre and entire Japanese facilities blowing up.  It's not typical Disney fare.

Disney Creatures: The final scene of the film sees an American eagle fly down to attack a Japanese octopus in a very unsubtle allegory for the USA's defeat of Japan.  Whilst it shies away from depicting the events of Hiroshima or Nagasaki, there is a final shot of a smoking Japan which hints at the terrible end to this part of the war.

Disney Land: The focus is, obviously, very much on the USA and Europe, with latter stages looking at Japan and the surrounding countries.  Most of the non-USA countries are depicted through maps although we do get some more detailed looks at generic areas of Japan - mainly military facilities and factories.

Disney Finale: I nearly didn't review Victory Through Air Power for my marathon, but for the sake of completeness I thought I'd give it a look.  It's not a lot of fun.  Initially, there is some good animation, and educational content, depicting the early days of aviation but as soon as the film starts to focus on the war effort (for both WW1 and WW2) is quickly becomes propaganda.  The worst aspect is how it paints the USA forces as the saviours of Europe and beyond.  The British forces are acknowledged but there is a real sense that, without the USA, there's no way we would have won the war.  There's one sequence involving Crete which makes the opinion of the USA's superiority over all other military forces abundantly clear. 

In a way, I'm glad I gave this a look, but it leaves a sour taste and is not a Disney film I think I will ever revisit.