The Fighting Seabees (1944)

Did you people see the same film I saw?

It's hard to see any effort in the film. There's no comedy to speak of, no real drama and, worst of all.

This movie was so-so. It had it's moments, but wasn't the greatest.

Very good movie overall, highly recommended. Most of the negative reviews don't have any merit and are all pollitically based. Give this movie a chance at least, and it might give you a different perspective.

THE FIGHTING SEABEES is a standard WW2 propaganda film featuring John Wayne in a typically gruff role as a leader of men. It's an example of routine wartime heroics that follows the adventures of one of the Construction Battalions that toured the Pacific islands, helping to build bases and providing aid to the soldiers and pilots using the area.The film is briskly plotted and follows all of the usual routines, with a little romance and characterisation of the main characters and plenty of action for the ground-level troops. Wayne is his usual likable hero although he doesn't get as much screen time to swagger this time around due to the amount of supporting characters. The best part of the film is the climactic battle, as violent and explosive as it is.

Directed by Edward Ludwig, based on a story by Borden Chase, who wrote the screenplay with Aeneas MacKenzie, this average war drama about the formation of Construction Battalions (C.B. - get it?) by the U.S. Navy during World War II also includes a love triangle subplot involving its three top-billed actors: John Wayne, Susan Hayward, and Dennis O'Keefe. Wayne plays a well known (and well liked, by his crews) construction company owner Wedge Donovan, who's recruited by Lieutenant Commander Robert Yarrow (O'Keefe) to help sell his idea to train and arm the construction specialists to his superiors.But Wayne's character (who dances the Jitterbug with Adele Mara, uncredited) is a bit of a hothead who doesn't take direction nor orders from others very well and that, in addition to his interest in Yarrow's girlfriend Connie Chesley (Hayward), is the basis for the story's conflict. The film's Score was nominated for an Academy Award.After Donovan's construction crew returns from doing a job for the Navy, during which several of his men are killed, Lt. Cmdr. Yarrow asks him to help go before some admirals to arm these specialists against the enemy. But when Donovan learns that the Navy wants to do more than just provide his men with weapons, that they want to train them (to fight properly) for perhaps 3 months or more, Wedge is impatient and refuses to cooperate further.Donovan decides to go with his men - William Frawley plays foreman Eddie Powers, Leonid Kinskey, J.M. Kerrigan, Grant Withers, Paul Fix, and Ben Welden (among others) - on their next job for the Navy, and Yarrow's newspaper reporter girlfriend Connie is assigned to go along for the story. She tells Donovan that the Lt. Cmdr. had been sent ahead to keep Wedge and his men from getting into trouble (e.g. the war). Their convoy heads for a Pacific island that's later invaded by the Japanese. During the invasion, when a few of his men are killed (because they weren't in the Navy's provided shelter), Donovan's temper gets the best of his judgment and he leads his construction crew into the middle of the crossfire that Yarrow had set–up to contend with Japan's invading force. The result is not pretty: a large number of Donovan's crew is killed or injured, including Connie, who'd been spending a considerable amount of time with Wedge.While Donovan is tending to her wound, she tells him that she loves him and Wedge proclaims the same before she passes out. Yarrow heard it all, but that doesn't keep him from forgiving and apologizing to Donovan's men for his error when, after realizing what he'd wrought, Wedge is at a loss for words.Wedge seems to have learned his lesson because he then helps Yarrow to form the Seabees, by recruiting construction specialists into training by the Navy for specific battalions (e.g. to build and repair runways and other requirements). Donovan's even given the rank of Lieutenant Commander in the Navy, working for Yarrow. When Connie's better, she's as upset to learn that Wedge doesn't want her as Yarrow is that she doesn't want him.Donovan and Yarrow then ship off to another Pacific island to build and secure a runway with a fuel depot. Unfortunately, his men make easy targets for the (smiling) Japanese snipers that still infest the "jungle". Naturally, this leads Donovan, who had changed and learned to perform within the Navy's system, to ignore Yarrow's orders once again and nearly cause the depot to fall into the now invading enemies' hands. But, like the cavalry, Donovan and his men who had been hunting the snipers return just in time to save the day (tractors & cranes in combat!), causing Wedge to lose his life heroically.After a ceremony honoring the brave Seabees and their successful defense, Yarrow and Connie decide that they can be together once again.

Has there ever been a film about the SeeBees? I had heard the term but was unaware of their contribution. Hence, I thank the war propaganda movement for this education.I assume that each branch and sub division were happy to merit film representation and exhibit capability, challenge, and bravery. Since I have limited experience with WWII, military channel primarily, I found this film watchable and suspenseful enough to captivate.The most shocking moment was not war related but the Duke doing the jitterbug with slick adroitness! How they managed to complement his image as the proverbial tough guy is beyond me, but perhaps he was delighted to get the heck outta Dodge with his typical character.Overall recommend for appreciating this group of brave men!

Probably the least sympathetic character ever played by The Duke. How many times is his character "Donovan" going to make the same mistake? This highly fictionalized account of the birth of the Seabees does little to inform OR entertain. I know that the war in the Pacific was still raging in 1944 when this was filmed but the constant stereotypes became tiresome very quickly. Every shot of Japanese fighters showed them as grinning baboons. The construction workers were all shown as drunks or incompetents. The love triangle was never believable and the misogynistic treatment of Susan Hayward was laughable as she was alternately treated like baggage or acted like a lapdog. Still, Susan Hayward was a bright spot in this picture if only for her occasional glimpse of potential as an actualized professional woman and her undeniable attractiveness.View if you must but don't expect any great (or even small) expositions about Seabees, war or love. This was a badly made propaganda film that should have been retired in 1946 when we didn't need to sign-on anymore Seabees to finish WWII. No doubt John Wayne was trying to do his patriotic duty by making this call-to-arms/shovels biopic but it misses on every cylinder to a "modern" viewer. There are too many decent WWII era films available to waste your time on this dog.