Breakfast In America Supertramp

Breakfast In America Album: Breakfast In America (1979)
by Supertramp

Written by: Richard Davies, Roger Hodgson

1941 is a 1979 American comedy film directed by Steven Spielberg and written by Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale. THESE ARE THE VERY PEOPLE RESPONSIBLE FOR MANY FILM BASED CONSPIRACIES!

The film stars an ensemble cast including Dan Aykroyd, Ned Beatty, John Belushi, John Candy, Christopher Lee, Tim Matheson, Toshiro Mifune, Robert Stack, Nancy Allen, and Mickey Rourke in his film debut. The story involves a panic in the Los Angeles area after the December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.

Co-writer Gale stated the plot is loosely based on what has come to be known as the Great Los Angeles Air Raid of 1942, as well as the bombardment of the Ellwood oil refinery, near Santa Barbara, by a Japanese submarine. Many other events in the film were based on real incidents, including the Zoot Suit Riots and an incident in which the U.S. Army placed an anti-aircraft gun in a homeowner's yard on the Maine coast.

The film received heavily mixed reviews from critics with criticism towards the script, pacing and humor but praise towards the visual effects, sound, production design, John Williams's score and cinematography.

Although 1941 was not as financially nor critically successful as many of Spielberg's other films, the film was still a box office success and it received belated popularity after an expanded version aired on ABC, with subsequent television broadcasts and home video reissues, raising it to cult status.

On Saturday, December 13, 1941, at 7:01 a.m. (six days after the attack on Pearl Harbor), an Imperial Japanese Navy submarine, commanded by Akiro Mitamura and carrying Kriegsmarine officer Wolfgang von Kleinschmidt, surfaces off the Californian coast. Wanting to destroy something "honorable" in Los Angeles, Mitamura decides to target Hollywood. Later that same morning, a 10th Armored Division M3 Lee tank crew, consisting of Sergeant Frank Tree, Corporal Chuck Sitarski, and Privates Foley, Reese, and Henshaw, are having breakfast at a cafe in Los Angeles where dishwasher Wally Stephens and his friend Dennis DeSoto work. Wally is planning to enter a dance contest at a club that evening with his girlfriend, Betty Douglas. Sitarski, who has an extremely short temper, instantly dislikes Wally and trips him, causing a fight and leaving Wally humiliated.

In Death Valley, United States Army Air Forces Captain Wild Bill Kelso lands his Curtiss P-40 Warhawk fighter at a roadside store and gas station, which he accidentally blows up. Meanwhile, in Los Angeles, Major General Joseph W. Stilwell attempts to calm the public, who believe Japan will attack California. During a press conference at Daugherty Field in Long Beach, Captain Loomis Birkhead, Stilwell's aide, meets his old flame Donna Stratton, who is General Stilwell's new secretary. Aware that Donna is sexually aroused by airplanes, Birkhead lures her into the cockpit of a B-17 bomber to seduce her. When his attempt fails, Donna punches him; as he falls, Birkhead accidentally releases a bomb, which rolls against the conference's grandstand and explodes, though Stilwell and the crowd escape unhurt.

At the Santa Monica oceanside home of her father Ward Douglas and his wife Joan, Betty and her friend Maxine Dexheimer, who have just become USO hostesses, tell Wally that they are only allowed to dance with servicemen as they are now the only male patrons allowed in the club. Wally hides in the garage when Ward, who disapproves of him, appears. Sgt. Tree and his crew arrive and inform Ward and Joan that the army wants to install an anti-aircraft battery in their yard. Sitarski begins flirting with Betty, and Wally falls from the loft where he was hiding. Wally and Sitarski recognize each other from the cafe, and the Sgt. Tree’s crew dumps Wally into a passing garbage truck after ejecting him from the premises.

Meanwhile, the Japanese submarine has become lost trying to find Los Angeles after their compass malfunctions. A landing party goes ashore and captures lumberjack Hollis "Holly" Wood. Aboard the sub, Hollis is searched and the crew is excited to find a small toy compass, which Hollis swallows. After the crew attempts to make Hollis excrete the compass by forcing him to drink prune juice, he escapes from the submarine.

Ward's neighbor, Angelo Scioli of the Ground Observer Corps, installs Claude and Herb in the Ferris wheel at the Ocean Front Amusement Park to scout for enemy aircraft. Determined to get Donna into an airplane, Birkhead drives her to the 501st Bomb Disbursement Unit in Barstow, where the mentally unstable Colonel "Mad Man" Maddox lets them borrow a plane. Donna, aroused from finally being in an airplane, begins to ravish Birkhead during the flight.

At the USO club, Sitarski drags Betty into the dance. Wally sneaks in and reunites with Betty. They win the dance contest, and the short-tempered Sitarski punches Wally, setting off a brawl between soldiers, sailors and zoot suiters which spills into the street and becomes a riot. Sgt. Tree and his crew break up the melee, just before L.A. goes on high alert when Birkhead and Donna fly over the city and anti-aircraft batteries open fire on them. Kelso pursues and shoots it down, causing it to land into the La Brea Tar Pits. Claude and Herb shoot down the passing P-40 after mistaking it for a Japanese Zero; Kelso crashlands in the city, where he informs the military authorities about the Japanese sub he spotted at the pier. Wally is put in command of the tank after Tree is accidentally incapacitated, and rescues Betty while Sitarski is accosting her. After Kelso's alert, Wally, Betty, Dennis and the tankers set off for the pier, followed by Kelso on a motorcycle.

At the Douglas' home, Ward spots the surfaced submarine and begins firing the anti-aircraft gun at it, wrecking his whole house in the process. The sub returns fire, hitting the Ferris wheel, which rolls into the ocean. When von Kleinschmidt tries to force the sub to retreat early, Mitamura throws him overboard. The tank arrives and then sinks when the submarine torpedoes the pier. Kelso jumps off the pier and swims to the submarine, where he is captured by the Japanese.

The next morning, Stilwell and soldiers arrive at the remains of the Douglas home, where the other protagonists have gathered. Ward vows that their Christmas will not be ruined by the enemy; to symbolize his point, he nails a Christmas wreath to his front door, causing his unstable house to collapse down the hillside. Stilwell, observing the disheveled crowd arguing, tells Sgt. Tree, "It's going to be a long war."