Thillaye visual effects producer, Mario Rachiele special effects, J. Story, Denny Kuhr, Joseph Stanley.Ĭamera (CFI color, Imax large-screen process), William Reeve editor, James Lahti music, Michel Cusson art director, David Laramy sound, Thierry Morlaas-Lurbe, Pritchard White supervising sound editor, Michel B. Produced by Pietro Serapiglia, Michael Williams, Stephen Low. War’s pyrotechnic hellishness is pushed in your face care of William Reeve’s lensing, but that doesn’t lessen the pic’s profile as a recruitment tool.Ī K2 Communications release of a Boeing presentation in association with K2 Communications of a Stephen Low Co. Tone borders on corny, and while the detailed attention to the procedures of each exercise is unmistakable, the initial exercise sequence is made a mess in the editing, with the second dogfight much more clearly delineated. Meanwhile, Low’s cameras are placed at extraordinarily close proximity to the pilots’ ground targets, which are obliterated in a stunning bombing exercise sequence rarely has the furious power of bombing been captured so intimately on camera, conveying a sickening sense of what it must feel to be under attack by the world’s most powerful fighter jets. There’s little doubt he will be whisked away safe and sound. Pic documents “Operation Red Flag,” an international training exercise among NATO-affiliated and 27 other air forces that convene at Nellis Air Force Base just outside Las Vegas.įor two weeks, Stratton (who narrates some brief first-person thoughts, as well as reflections about his WWII fighter ace grandfather) is sent through the Red Flag ringer in his amazingly agile F-15 Eagle: He’s chased, he hunts, and he’s even dropped behind “enemy” lines for a search-and-rescue mission. Stratton - must endure before being shipped off to battle in the Middle East.

Instead, the central concerns of “Fighter Pilot” are the tasks and exercises that an Air Force pilot trainee - in this case, an all-American guy named Capt. Director Stephen Low is either unable or unwilling to do this, leaving the distinct sense that a master flight cameraman like Greg McGillivray would have been the man for this job.

Presumably, the greatest strength of an Imax format film about flying would be placing viewers in the cockpit and immersing eyes and ears in the total flight experience.

Fighter pilot operation red flag