Gratuitous Llama Netflix Geekery Confession

I rented an old Cliff Robertson movie this weekend, 633 Squadron. It's the story of a raid by RAF de Havilland Mosquito light bombers against a secret Nazi rocket fuel production plant hidden in a Norwegian fjord. They can't bomb the plant directly, but instead have to hit the cliff above it, setting off just the seismic activity necessary to cause a landslide and bury the plant.

As war movies go, it's distinctly......eh. Not the top rank. But not at the bottom, either.

In fact, I like this movie for three specific reasons:

1. Lots of really cool arial shots of Mosquitoes doing this that and the other. I've always liked these planes, in large part because they were built of plywood.

2. Okay, it's a spoiler, but the entire squadron is wiped out after having successfully completed their mission. The sole survivor is Flying Officer Hoppy Hopkinson, who was played by Angus Lennie. Lennie also played Flying Officer Archibald "The Mole" Ives, the little Scot who went stir-crazy and was shot down while trying to climb the wire in The Great Escape. I like to think that his survival here somehow made up for that a bit.

3. Perhaps the most important reason, the movie's theme, which I like a lot and which also was ripped off by Monty Python to cover a silly little war montage in the midst of one of their funniest Flying Circus episodes, the "Light Entertainment War".

Yes, perhaps it's time to seek professional help.