Crash Dive shows America's heart on its sleeve in 1943. Filmed in stunning Technicolor and featuring the great Tyrone Power, along with fine support work by Dana Andrews, Harry Morgan, James Gleason, and Ben Carter, Crash Dive is a feel-good action/romance yarn that will stand up well to second or third viewings. Like many such vehicles, the movie is vulnerable to critical comments regarding technical issues ( like the German "sub base", and the submarine interiors) and the somewhat tiresome love triangle plot element. It also would have been nice to have seen crew members brought more to life ( like Destination Tokyo). Yet, the movie gives more focus on a black sailor (played estimably by Ben Carter) than you will see in other war pictures of the period. There are great exterior shots of New London Conn during the war too. Whenever I am on Rte 95 crossing the Mystic River, I gaze up and down that place and in my mind's eye I can envision USN subs--some doomed for Davey Jones Locker-- leaving for harm's way in 1943 in service to the Red Whit and Blue. That's the allure of Crash Dive. It brings it back to life. And when the credits roll by at the end, and you are urged to buy war bonds in this theater, somehow and only for a whisper of time, the echoes are awakened and the peril and glory are again alive.
Review of Crash Dive
