THE BATTLE OF MIDWAY is a U.S. Navy-sponsored documentary about one of the most famous modern naval battles in the Pacific during World War II. The celebrated director John Ford (Commander John Ford, USNR) presents the battle as it happened with little, if any, post production elements added other than narration. Footage is captured from every possible vantage point, with Ford and his cameramen risking their lives, literally, in the battle zone. (Ford was in fact wounded while filming.) Enemy and friendly planes alike are shot down in this film, in which the loss of American lives is not sugarcoated or censored but grimly presented as a harsh reality of war.

release year: 1942

star(s): Charlton Heston    Henry Fonda