Posted on 03/16/2024 6:13:21 PM PDT by simpson96
The Best Years of Our Lives is a 1946 American drama film directed by William Wyler and starring Myrna Loy, Fredric March, Dana Andrews, Teresa Wright, Virginia Mayo and Harold Russell. The film is about three United States servicemen re-adjusting to societal changes and civilian life after coming home from World War II. The three men come from different services with different ranks that do not correspond with their civilian social class backgrounds.
The film was a critical and commercial success. It won seven Academy Awards: Best Picture, Best Director (William Wyler), Best Actor (Fredric March), Best Supporting Actor (Harold Russell), Best Film Editing (Daniel Mandell), Best Adapted Screenplay (Robert E. Sherwood), and Best Original Score (Hugo Friedhofer).
In addition, Russell was also awarded an honorary Academy Award, the only time in history that two such awards were given for a single performance.
It was the highest-grossing film in the United States since the release of Gone with the Wind.
"The Best Years Of Our Lives" (1946) aircraft graveyard scene
An excellent film
I wonder where the airport graveyard scene was filmed? Kingman,Az?
As a teen, I heard a WW II B-17 mechanic with the Eighth Air Force in England tell of removing an unexploded German anti-aircraft rocket from the wing of a B-17. With repairs, the B-17 returned to service. A year later, back in the states after the end of the war, he saw the same bomber as one of hundreds in a field waiting to be broken up.
All 3 men—no matter their station in civilin life—had a shared experience in the war. Despite the fact they were in three different branches and different theaters—the general experiences of servicemen were similiar—as it was for all us service memmbers .
That was a good movie. The guy on the left (in the picture) was the one that actually lost both his arms in the war.
I need to give this film another shot. My previous experience with it was not good.
A side note about the crack from the junkman about “you guys up there in the air, while I was stuck down in the muck in a tank” ... it was safer to be a marine on Iwo Jima than it was to be a B-17 crewman.
The best Post WWII drama made.
As I look around at what has become of our country, I weep for those fine Americans of that generation.
Actually, I don’t think he did lose his hands in the war. I think he lost them in a farming machinery accident, but his role in that movie was groundbreaking, I believe.
Actually he did loose his hands in wartime. He was a demolition instructor when a fuse ignited and set some tnt off.
One of my all time faves
L
yeah, but safer, and miserable, are two different things...
Great scene from a great movie. Loved that the Dana Andrews character’s mother was named Hortense.
The Eighth Air Force took terrible losses. The first raid on Schweinfurt it lost over one half of its aircraft and crews.
The airplane graveyard was in the either Pomona or Ontario area.
I was under the impression Hortense was his stepmother. He called her Hortense. He called his father Pops.
I think you’re right! You don’t get away with anything on FR lol!
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