***SPOILERS*** Off the wall British WWII propaganda movie that has Polish musical whiz composer and pianist Stefan, or just call me Steve for short, Radetzky (Anton Warbook) give up the good life of traveling around the world, that still isn't controlled by Nazi Germany, giving concerts for Polish relief. Steve instead is all fired up to join the famed Polish "Suicide Squadron", the films original title, back in Britain to participate against the German Luftwaffe in the "Battle of Britain".
We already know what the outcome of Steve's contribution as a Polish suicide or kamikaze pilot was by seeing the totally out of touch with reality Steve in a London hospital room in the fall of 1940. It's there that Steve for hours at a time mindlessly bangs away at a piano, that was provided for him by the hospital staff, thus keeping everyone, doctors nurses and patients, there form getting their much needed sleep! With the hospital and the surrounding neighborhood suffering from around the clock bombings by the German Luftwaffe!
It's then that we, in a long long flashback, get to see what were the reasons for Steve's mental deterioration that started a year ago when the Germans invaded his homeland Poland in September 1939. That's when Steve's now estranged wife American newspaper reporter and classical music lover Carol Peters, Sally Gray, ran into Steve in bombed out Warsaw playing a piano as if, with bombs falling all around him, he doesn't have a care in the world. This strange scene gets even stranger when Carol, shocked at Steve's strange behavior, tells the what looks like completely out of it piano player how he could be so flippant while his country is totally in flames. An outraged Steve, finally showing some emotion, reminds Carol that with no petrol left in the country how could he, a polish airman, be able to take off and battle it out with the hated Germans when his plane's gas tank is completely empty!
It's then as if a miracle happened there comes the news that there are some 30 planes available with full gas tanks to both fly west on a suicide mission into the German heartland or fly east to neutral, at the time, Romania to await further instructions from the Polish Government in Exile! It comes as no surprise that Steve is chosen by lot to be the lucky, or unlucky in Steve's case, guy to be one of two Polish airman to take a flight out of harms way into friendly Romania! What Steve didn't know at the time is that the drawing was fixed in his favor to keep him the great Stefan "Steve" Radetzky, a Polish natural treasure, from getting himself, together with his great musical talents, killed in the war. It was determined by higher ups, from Prime Minister Winston Churchill on down, in the British Government that Steve would be a much better weapon against the Nazis in him going around the world giving concerts to inspire people to support the war instead of him risking his life in fighting it. It's in Americia while giving a concert in New York City that Steven is reunited with Carol, who at first he didn't recognize, and the two musical lovebirds are married in what seemed like before the day is even over!
Supposedly, with a title like "Suicide Squadron", a war movie we finally get to see some action, air to air combat over the British skies, with a really charged up Steve dropping both his music and Carol, who now wants him to stay behind the lines and not risk his life fighting the Nazis, and go join his beloved "Suicide Squadron" that's now attached to the British RAF in the life and death battle with the German Luftwaffe in the "Battle of Britain".
***SPOILERS*** After waiting for almost the entire movie to get to see some war action the films action sequence, that lasted about three minutes, was not only boring but mindless as well. Steve now airborne with a set of ill fitting pilot goggles, that make his look as if he were crossed-eyed, engages the enemy knocking two Nazi fighter planes out of the sky with his fighter plane's machine gun but also slamming into a slow moving Nazi attack bomber, kamikaze style, before it could drop it's bombs on an RAF airfield. Of course, as we saw at the beginning of the movie, Steve survived the carnage almost unscathed with only a slight loss of memory for all his troubles in trying to unsuccessfully kill himself for Poland.
The ending is about as corny as it can get in this very corny film with Carol suddenly showing up unexpectedly at Steve's hospital room where his memory miraculously recovers as he finally gets his Mojo, piano playing ability, back! Now a totally cured and rejuvenated Steve start to knock out his masterpiece that he composed while under the gun in far off Warsaw over a year ago: "The Warsaw Concerto"!
We already know what the outcome of Steve's contribution as a Polish suicide or kamikaze pilot was by seeing the totally out of touch with reality Steve in a London hospital room in the fall of 1940. It's there that Steve for hours at a time mindlessly bangs away at a piano, that was provided for him by the hospital staff, thus keeping everyone, doctors nurses and patients, there form getting their much needed sleep! With the hospital and the surrounding neighborhood suffering from around the clock bombings by the German Luftwaffe!
It's then that we, in a long long flashback, get to see what were the reasons for Steve's mental deterioration that started a year ago when the Germans invaded his homeland Poland in September 1939. That's when Steve's now estranged wife American newspaper reporter and classical music lover Carol Peters, Sally Gray, ran into Steve in bombed out Warsaw playing a piano as if, with bombs falling all around him, he doesn't have a care in the world. This strange scene gets even stranger when Carol, shocked at Steve's strange behavior, tells the what looks like completely out of it piano player how he could be so flippant while his country is totally in flames. An outraged Steve, finally showing some emotion, reminds Carol that with no petrol left in the country how could he, a polish airman, be able to take off and battle it out with the hated Germans when his plane's gas tank is completely empty!
It's then as if a miracle happened there comes the news that there are some 30 planes available with full gas tanks to both fly west on a suicide mission into the German heartland or fly east to neutral, at the time, Romania to await further instructions from the Polish Government in Exile! It comes as no surprise that Steve is chosen by lot to be the lucky, or unlucky in Steve's case, guy to be one of two Polish airman to take a flight out of harms way into friendly Romania! What Steve didn't know at the time is that the drawing was fixed in his favor to keep him the great Stefan "Steve" Radetzky, a Polish natural treasure, from getting himself, together with his great musical talents, killed in the war. It was determined by higher ups, from Prime Minister Winston Churchill on down, in the British Government that Steve would be a much better weapon against the Nazis in him going around the world giving concerts to inspire people to support the war instead of him risking his life in fighting it. It's in Americia while giving a concert in New York City that Steven is reunited with Carol, who at first he didn't recognize, and the two musical lovebirds are married in what seemed like before the day is even over!
Supposedly, with a title like "Suicide Squadron", a war movie we finally get to see some action, air to air combat over the British skies, with a really charged up Steve dropping both his music and Carol, who now wants him to stay behind the lines and not risk his life fighting the Nazis, and go join his beloved "Suicide Squadron" that's now attached to the British RAF in the life and death battle with the German Luftwaffe in the "Battle of Britain".
***SPOILERS*** After waiting for almost the entire movie to get to see some war action the films action sequence, that lasted about three minutes, was not only boring but mindless as well. Steve now airborne with a set of ill fitting pilot goggles, that make his look as if he were crossed-eyed, engages the enemy knocking two Nazi fighter planes out of the sky with his fighter plane's machine gun but also slamming into a slow moving Nazi attack bomber, kamikaze style, before it could drop it's bombs on an RAF airfield. Of course, as we saw at the beginning of the movie, Steve survived the carnage almost unscathed with only a slight loss of memory for all his troubles in trying to unsuccessfully kill himself for Poland.
The ending is about as corny as it can get in this very corny film with Carol suddenly showing up unexpectedly at Steve's hospital room where his memory miraculously recovers as he finally gets his Mojo, piano playing ability, back! Now a totally cured and rejuvenated Steve start to knock out his masterpiece that he composed while under the gun in far off Warsaw over a year ago: "The Warsaw Concerto"!