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Here is the most unusual feature film
Walt Disney ever made.
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A film intended not so much to entertain,
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but to send a message.
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Walt, like many people,
was impressed by the text
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of a book called
Victory Through Air Power,
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written by Major Alexander P. De Seversky.
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In it, this Russian born
naturalized American citizen,
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who became a key figure in
the advancement of U.S. military aviation,
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called for an overhaul of our priorities.
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He was convinced that
the only way to win the war
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was to focus our energies
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on creating long-range bomber planes.
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Remember that when this film
was released in 1943,
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victory in Europe and the Pacific
was far from certain.
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...spearhead of short-range aviation,
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pushed step by step through the Balkans.
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There was no end in sight
and our losses were tremendous.
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Walt believed in the principles
of Seversky's book.
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And felt it was his patriotic duty
to spread the word.
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By making a Technicolor feature film
about the subject,
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with limited commercial potential,
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in the midst of many other wartime duties,
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Walt quite simply put his money
where his mouth was.
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The message Seversky delivers,
quite convincingly in this film,
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isn't about aggression or warmongering.
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It's about winning a war against enemies
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who were bent on world domination.
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A war America stayed out of,
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until we were attacked
without provocation at Pearl Harbor.
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That's the historical context
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that gives meaning to this film today.
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For animation buffs,
it's yet another example
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of how skillfully the Disney artists
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adapted their visual
storytelling techniques
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to a deadly serious purpose.
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And how successful they were.
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In the introductory history of aviation,
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there's room for humor.
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Even in the later sections of the film,
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there's tremendous creativity.
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From the staging of battle scenes and
explosions to the use of visual metaphors.
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To make sure Major Seversky
made his presentation
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as persuasively as possible,
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Walt hired a professional director,
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a man of long experience
on stage and in Hollywood,
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H.C. Potter,
to film these lecture segments.
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Potter's many movie credits include
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Mr. Blandings Builds His Dream House,
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The Farmer's Daughter, Hell's A'Poppin',
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and the story of Vernon and Irene Castle.
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But more importantly,
he was a flier himself,
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and already acquainted with its star.
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He certainly did his job well in this movie,
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because Seversky comes off quite well,
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and doesn't seem stiff or severe.
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When I interviewed Mr. Potter years ago,
he had fond memories of Seversky,
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whom he knew as Sasha.
But he also remembered
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he had to shoot
those sequences at night
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because Walt didn't have
sufficient soundproofing
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to drown out the noise
from Lockheed Aircraft nearby.
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Potter's approach was to make
Seversky's speeches seem as far
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from a lecture as possible.
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So he gave him lots of movement
and other suggestions
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to make the speeches seem
as casual as possible.
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He especially remembered one night,
when Sasha couldn't hit his marks,
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the places where the camera and
lighting were set up for him.
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He said, "Hank,
how can I remember the words,
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"the expression, the meaning,
the walking without limping,"
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because he had one wooden leg,
"and hit these marks,
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"and think of what I'm saying
at the same time?"
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Potter replied,
"When you're flying airplanes,
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"you're flying a plane, you're navigating,
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"you're looking at the ground
to see if you're going
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"where you're supposed to be going.
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"You're listening to the radio,
watching for other planes,
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"and checking your instruments,
all at the same time. "
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He concluded in a mock Russian accent,
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"Your model should be,
'Dewide the attention'."
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Seversky loved that, and from that time on
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before every shot,
the crew would chant,
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"Dewide the attention. "
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Movie critics weren't crazy about the film.
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Walt Disney's own distributor, RKO,
didn't want to release it.
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So Walt put the film in theaters
through United Artists.
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But the most important response
to the movie came from Winston Churchill.
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When he flew to Quebec
for an Allied conference,
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and learned that President Roosevelt
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hadn't seen the movie,
he and Air Marshal Tedder
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prodded him until he ordered
that a print be sent to him.
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H.C. Potter was told by Walt
that it was only after
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Roosevelt saw Victory Through Air Power,
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that our country made the commitment
to long-range bombing.
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And that, after all, was the reason
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Walt committed to making
this movie in the first place.
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Because of its topicality,
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the Disney Studio decided to keep this film
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in the vaults at the close of World War ll.
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Only the history of aviation sequence
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was seen in the years since then.
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It's with great pleasure that we present
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Victory Through Air Power, in its entirety.
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