wsutton_49 I was stationed at Beale AFB near Marysville/Yuba City, Ca in the 1980's and there is an excellent local book about the history of the area, including Beale. When the movie was made and before the SR-71 came along there was a SAC Bomb Wing there, as there was at Travis AFB. At least some of Gathering of Eagles, including the scene of an Officers' Wives Club meeting and scenes inside the wing commander's quarters were shot on Beale. The base received some payment from the makers in the form of a swimming pool built near the Alert Facility (it was later filled in when the bomb wing left Beale and security was tightened due to the SR-71).

thinker1691 If you took the time to see this film, you should take the time to investigate what led up to suspicious and distrusting world Governments spending so much time, effort and manpower to frighten populations to the point of spending untold billions for a war which was concocted out of fear rather than reality. There are those who say, The military created SAC to prevent a global war and which justified the bottomless Money Pit which continues to this day. The same can be said by those who believe, we created a defensive system against fire breathing dragons and since there has never been an attack by dragons, proves the Dragon defensive system worked. That said, one can watch as Rock Hudson as Col. Jim Caldwell as he takes command of a substandard Air Force base and with a proficiency ax brings the wing into line with others bases in the United States. Helping him is handsome Rod Taylor as Col. Hollis Farr his second in command. Barry Sullivan plays Col. Bill Fowler with Kevin McCarthy as Gen. 'Happy Jack' Kirby, Henry Silva as Col. Joe Garcia and Robert Lansing as Sgt. Banning. A superb cast and a fine film. ***

buckboard I'm more than a little amused by the current-day huffiness about smoking and other 21st century mores superimposed on a flick made more than 40 years ago. The movie is well-made, well-acted, and authentic--although the script is a little hackneyed. But that's mostly because it's a remake, not just of "Twelve O'Clock High" as pointed out elsewhere in comments, but also of "Above and Beyond" (the scenes between Hudson and Peach virtually mirror those between Robert Taylor and Eleanor Parker), screen-written by Sy Bartlett's collaborator on TOH, Beirne Lay Jr.Where it fell flat was that it attempted to counter two books that soon after (as a result of Hollywood reaction to the Cuban Missile Crisis) became doomsday movies--"Fail-Safe" (the premise of which was then and eventually was proved by time to be totally false), and one of my personal favorites, "Dr. Strangelove etc". AGOE got caught in the anti-militaristic paradigm shift started by the Cuban Missile Crisis and the Kennedy Assassination, and ended by the Vietnam War.I was a dependent on an Air Force base when I first saw this movie at the base theater (and at a SAC base when I saw Strangelove), and my friends and I thought the flick was a riot--the depiction of base housing in this and "X-15" were unlike anything we ever lived in!!!! (Jimmy Stewart's first set of quarters in "Strategic Air Command" was closer to the mark.)It's a good flick--not great, but interesting and representative of its time.

Michael D Mellgard When I was very young, from 5 until 8 years old, Mom worked civil service at Turner AFB in Albany, Georgia. I vividly remember the B-52's taking off and landing. Watching the scene with Hudson and Taylor on the tarmac timing the take-offs brought that memory back as though it was yesterday..We actually lived on the base for awhile before moving into Albany. The housing that the officers lived in reminds me of going over for dinners and getting to wear the flight helmets...imagine a little kid running around the mid-century home with that on his head. My brother would fight over who got to wear one. I cannot comment on the script and the actual life of the members of the AF since I was just a little kid. I do remember Mom coming home from the base the day President Kennedy was murdered and saying the the whole base was gearing up as though WW III was about to start. Hudson's character would not be out of place in the service, since as a former military man, I can say I have served under men who makes him look like a pussy cat. The fact that the film was able to use authentic locales makes it much more enjoyable. I work in the prop industry in Hollywood and I was practically salivating at the production design until I remembered that it was current for the time.