Warbirds of “Dive Bomber” – The Big E/Air Group 6

The USS Enterprise was filmed for Dive Bomber in the Spring of 1941, with Bull Halsey overseeing operations. Word is Bull did not kowtow to Kurtiz and wasn’t thrilled about having to have Hollywood hanging about his ship and crew, but bigwigs in Washington wanted this film, correctly believing it would be a hugely successful recruiting film. Bull, in turn, was very correctly anticipating and preparing for possible war in the Pacific. This is why many of the Air Groups’ aircraft (the Enterprise’s and Saratoga’s) are painted gray, rather than the much more colorful pre-war colors. At the request of Warner Brothers, some planes retained their original colors until completion of filming.