Alfred Newman–Opening scene 12 O’Clock High

Let’s go back to Alfred Newman in his role as the music director at 20th Century Fox. Many music directors and conductors are good at handling the soundtrack chores of one genre. Alfred was just plain good. His skills as a composer, orchestrator and music director/conductor were applied to all of Fox’s movies, and all of those soundtracks added to the quality coming out of the studio.

What about drama? How about movies, such as:
Dodsworth (1936) with Walter Huston;
Beloved Enemy (1936) with Merle Oberon;
Dead End (1937) with Humphrey Bogart;
History Is Made at Night (1937) with Charles Boyer;
Wuthering Heights (1939) with Lawrence Olivier;
Young Mr. Lincoln (1939) with Henry Fonda;
The Hunchback of Notre Dame (1939) with Charles Laughton;
Grapes of Wrath (1940) with Henry Fonda;
The Little Foxes (1941) with Bette Davis;
I Wake Up Screaming (1941) with Victor Mature;
The Song of Bernadette (1943) with Jennifer Jones;
Miracle on 34th Street (1947) with Maureen O’Hara;
Calling Northside 777 (1948) with James Stewart;
Panic in the Streets (1950) with Richard Widmark;
All About Eve (1950) with Bette Davis;
People Will Talk (1951) with Cary Grant;
Bus Stop (1956) with Marilyn Monroe;
Anastasia (1956) with Ingrid Bergman; and
The Diary of Anne Frank (1959) with Millie Perkins.

What about westerns? How about movies, such as:
The Cowboy and the Lady (1938) with Gary Cooper;
My Darling Clementine (1946) with Henry Fonda;
The Gunfighter (1950) with Gregory Peck;
Broken Arrow (1950) with James Stewart; and
Nevada Smith (1966) with Steve McQueen.

What about adventure movies? How about movies, such as:
The Count of Monte Cristo (1934) with Robert Donat;
Bulldog Drummond Strikes Back (1934) with Ronald Coleman;
Clive of India (1935) with Ronald Coleman;
Call of the Wild (1935) with Clark Gable;
Wee Willie Winkie (1937) with Shirley Temple;
The Prisoner of Zenda (1937) with Ronald Coleman;
The Adventures of Marco Polo (1938) with Gary Cooper;
Only Angels Have Wings (1939) with Cary Grant;
The Real Glory (1939) with Gary Cooper;
The Mark of Zorro (1940) with Tyrone Power;
Blood and Sand (1941) with Tyrone Power; and
The Black Swan (1942) with Tyrone Power.

What about war movies? How about movies, such as:
Beau Geste (1939) with Ray Milland;
Foreign Correspondent (1940) with Joel McCrea;
A Yank in the R.A.F. (1941) with Tyrone Power;
Joan of Paris (1942) with Paul Henreid;
To the Shores of Tripoli (1942) with John Payne;
Flight Lieutenant (1942) with Pat O’Brien;
Immortal Sergeant (1943) with Henry Fonda;
Crash Dive (1943) with Tyrone Power;
The Fighting Sullivans (1944) with Anne Baxter;
The Purple Heart (1944) with Dana Andrews;
A Wing and a Prayer (1944) with Don Ameche;
13 Rue Madeleine (1946) with James Cagney;
Twelve O’Clock High (1949) with Gregory Peck;
The Big Lift (1950) with Montgomery Clift;
What Price Glory (1952) with James Cagney;
The Desert Rats (1953) with Richard Burton; and
The Counterfeit Traitor (1962) with William Holden.

Oh, and did we mention musicals? First, let’s look at adaptations from Broadway:
Whoopee! (1930, Walter Donaldson) with Eddie Cantor;
Call Me Madame (1953, Irving Berlin) with Ethel Merman;
Carousel (1956, Rodgers and Hammerstein) with Gordon MacRae;
The King and I (1956, Rodgers and Hammerstein) with Yul Brynner;
South Pacific (1958, Rodgers and Hammerstein) with Mitzy Gaynor;
Flower Drum Song (1961, Rodgers and Hammerstein) with Nancy Kwon; and Camelot (1967, Lerner and Loewe) with Richard Harris.

How about musicals written for the screen, including:
–the Eddie Cantor movies (Roman Scandals, The Kid from Spain, Kid Millions, Strike Me Pink);
–the Betty Grable and Alice Faye movies (Tin Pan Alley, That Night in Rio, The Great American Broadcast, Moon Over Miami, Weekend in Havana, SAong of the Islands, Footlight Serenade, Hello, Frisco, Hello, Coney Island, Sweet Rosie O’Grady, The Gang’s All Here, Diamond Horseshoe, The Dolly Sisters, Mother Wore Tights);
–the big band movies (Orchestra Wives, Springtime in the Rockies);
–the Broadway revues (Hallalujah, I’m A Bum!, Broadway Melody of 1936, Born to Dance, The Goldwyn Follies, Broadway Melody of 1940);
–the Irving Berlin movies (Alexander’s Ragtime Band, There’s No Business Like Show Business);
–State Fair (1945, Rodgers and Hammerstein) and Centennial Summer 1946, Jerome Kern); and
–the biopics (My Gal Sal, I Wonder Who’s Kissing Her Now, With a Song in My Heart, Stars and Stripes Forever).

We will go back to musicals soon enough; however, we are going to start with a soundtrack that is quite unusual. We are going to give you just over 3 minutes of music from an opening sequence in Twelve O’Clock High, as we transition from a warm, sunny day in peaceful 1949 England to less pleasant time seven years. The transition takes place in the mind a an Army Air Corps officer who witnessed the horror and honor of the 918th Bomb Group, one of the first American units to run daylight, low level, precision bombing runs over German industrial plants.

We strongly urge you to watch the entire movie. In this brief clip, Dean Jagger, Oscar winner as Best Supporting Actor, goes from being a man on vacation to a man re-living the agony of the 1942 experience. Gregory Peck gives one of his best performances, and the cast is filled with brilliant character actors who give utterly believable performances of men doing their best to perform under unbelievable circumstances. Pay attention to the performance of Paul Stewart (who normally plays villains), as the Army doctor who must decide whether men can fly or not, whether they have already given “maximum effort.” This movie examines the serious side of Catch-22. Are men going out on suicide missions sane or not? How long can they function under combat stress?

While the names in the movie are fictional, the story is taken from the experiences of actual members of the Army Air Corps (8th Air Force) and is a thrilling read in and of itself. Please go to wikipedia to read the real names and experiences of the flyers and support personnel. Please.