The War Lover (1962) on Netflix
Captain Buzz Rickson flies a B-17 over wartime Britain and takes the missions that carry the most risk. His co-pilot, Lt. Ed Bolland, meets Daphne Caldwell, a young Englishwoman.
- Netflix3.3/5
- IMDb6.6/102,539 votes
- Rotten TomatoesNot available
Trailer
Plot summary
Captain Buzz Rickson commands a crew flying a B-17 bomber in Britain during World War II. Ordered to turn back from a raid over Germany because of cloud cover, he takes his squadron down under the clouds and finishes the job, counting on his standing as the group's best pilot to shield him. Lt. Ed Bolland, his co-pilot, trusts his flying, though the base flight surgeon cannot settle whether Rickson is a hero or a psychopath. Between missions the two men meet Daphne Caldwell, a young Englishwoman who attracts them both. Bolland grows disillusioned with Rickson as the crew's navigator, Lt. Marty Lynch, is pressured to leave after questioning how Rickson behaves.
Cast
Show all 15 cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about The War Lover (1962)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Mike Reilly, the stuntman doubling for Robert Wagner, was killed during production of The War Lover when he fell to his death in a parachuting accident.
- Three Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress bombers formed the film's main aerial component: one B-17G and two postwar PB-1W Coast Guard rescue aircraft from the United States. After extensive modifications, the three warbirds flew the arduous transatlantic crossing to Britain.
- Martin Caidin, one of the pilots who flew the B-17s for the film, later wrote the novels behind the TV series The Six Million Dollar Man and the film Marooned, and chronicled the crossing in the book Everything But The Flak.
- The film used rare footage of real air combat, including a Messerschmitt Bf 109G firing a 20 mm cannon at B-17s, and also reused the crash landing footage from the 1949 film Twelve O'Clock High.
