Rousing wartime propaganda that helped bolster the American spirit. It was the Republic studio's salute to the all-American Volunteer Group flying for China and Chiang Kai-Shek (long before Pearl Harbor) who received 500 dollars for every Japanese plane shot down. John Wayne, in his first of his many war films, is the leader of one squadron of carefree pilots, and he displays a soft heart beneath the tough, blustering exterior. Virtually a straight lift from the story of Howard Hawks' Only Angels Have Wings, the film displays all the clichés that were becoming commonplace in Hollywood aerial combat films, including frequent shots of Japanese pilots dying horrible deaths in graphic close-up, bullets smashing through the canopies of their planes, and exploding in their faces, blood pouring from their mouths and eyes. It was left to Willie Fung, as Jim, the Chinese waiter who refuses to eat so-called Chinese food, to provide much-needed laughs in an otherwise grim drama.

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