Wonderful character development!

Disappointment for a huge fan!

It’s fine. It's literally the definition of a fine movie. You’ve seen it before, you know every beat and outcome before the characters even do. Only question is how much escapism you’re looking for.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

MOSQUITO SQUADRON is an average little war film about the British efforts to blow up a German base in France which is responsible for developing the technology used to bomb London and other British cities. It's a film that's pretty derivative of other movies which have come before such as THE DAM BUSTERS and it's also a rather uneven viewing experience, although there's much that's worthwhile here too.The cast is somewhat unremarkable aside from lead actor David McCallum. McCallum is fresh off his success in America in THE MAN FROM UNCLE here and he delivers a good performance as the dedicated young pilot who feels that he needs to win out no matter what. His allies are all well cast and there's a priggish turn from the ever-imposing Charles Gray as the commodore, but too much of the screen time is taken up with McCallum's love for Suzanne Neve as the wife of a dead co-pilot. I appreciate the tragedy in such a situation but it really slows the film down at times when it should be flying along.Footage of the planes at work and dropping their bouncing bomb payloads are the best part of the movie. The climactic action sequences are well handled and readily exciting and the dated nature of some of the effects, in particular the back projection, is easy to forgive. With a little more drive in the flagging midsection, MOSQUITO SQUADRON could have been something great; as it stands it's an average little film.

Squadron Leader Quint Munroe is struggling to come to terms with the probable death of his friend and comrade, Sq. Leader David Scott. After choosing to leave the squadron, Quint is approached to take part in a crucial mission to bomb a château in occupied France that houses a deadly German flying bomb factory. The top secret mission will involve using a new land bouncing bomb that needs to be delivered with the ultimate precision, which is why they want the respected Quint to lead the assault. To further complicate matters, Quint starts to fall in love with David's widow Beth, will Quint take up the task?, can he succeed?, just why have the Germans dropped a parcel on base containing a roll of film?.It's not very good, that's really all there is to it, Mosquito Squadron is a collage of far better films put together to make one complete whole. David McCallum, bless him, 6 years after he was integral to The Great Escape's success, he is found sadly lacking as a lead actor asked to carry a film. Charles Gray proves that Blofeld really was a career high and the rest of the cast cover themselves in mud. Director Boris Sagal shows that he should have stayed at doing TV work, whilst the writers i hope were embarrassed to have been paid for their work on this one.So why after all my moaning do i give it a generous 3/10?, well the model work is half decent and Frank Cordell's score is deserving of far better, whilst editor John S. Smith should be applauded for his cheek. But really this is one to avoid, the sort of film that was shown prior to the main event in a double feature, rent The Dam Busters and 633 Squadron to see just why this film falls some way short of being entertaining. 3/10

At a time when many a star-studded and big-budgeted WWII actioner emerged, this modest effort seemed definitely like second-tier material – offering customary but efficient thrills and decent spectacle, somewhat in the vein of 633 SQUADRON (1964)…with which it shares much of the plot and action footage! In this respect, the film also owes its German secret weapon to OPERATION CROSSBOW (1965) and its bouncing bombs to THE DAM BUSTERS (1955); no wonder, then, that the end result feels awfully contrived (particularly at the climax, when successive to a couple of failed attempts, it has a wounded pilot wilfully crash smack into the warehouse where the rockets are manufactured!). Besides, the narrative tends too often towards romantic/sentimental complications: the relationship between the two leads being obstructed, for one thing, by the hero having been the best friend of the woman’s husband and, later, by the knowledge he shares with her maimed brother that the man had survived an air crash but is being kept prisoner in a château marked for obliteration during an Allied air raid led by the hero himself! The credentials are strictly below-par (the score, typically an asset in this type of flick, attempts to be rousing but succeeds only in being bland) and the casting a mix of TV actors (THE MAN FROM U.N.C.L.E.’s David McCallum – who delivers a brooding performance – and Suzanne Neve from U.F.O.) and colorful character performers (Charles Gray as the pompous yet stern Air Commodore and Vladek Sheybal as the erudite but fishy Nazi officer in charge of the prison/plant fortress). Mind you, while being no great shakes (and probably instantly forgettable), the film proves mildly engaging – to say nothing of eminently watchable – along the way; when all is said and done, there are certainly far worse titles to spend 90 minutes of your life on…

Actually, this comment is unlikely to contain spoilers for the simple reason that there is nothing to spoil.I have seen some wretched movies in my time but this one is surely dancing on the edge of disaster canyon.There is another movie that most wartime adventure fans will have seen, called '633 Squadron'. It's a well-paced action drama with just enough of the characters' personal lives to give them an interesting depth. Nothing fancy, just predictable. There's a Dam-Busters/Guns of Navarone do-or-die mission to fulfil at all costs, and so on. A competent cast is led by Cliff Robertson, George Chakiris and other stalwarts. And of course, there's that unforgettable stirring theme music, arguably the real star of the show.Well, after this movie was cut and canned, and the studios closed for the day. Someone sneaked into the cutting-room and rummaged through the bins. They found all of the takes no director in his right mind would touch with a barge-pole and hurried back to their little bedsits. Then they came up with a story so preposterous that only a lobotomised hamster could take it seriously, and looked around for a schmuck - I mean star.The best they could come up with was David McCallum. He alone led a bunch of nobodies through a montage of hastily-pasted '633 Squadron' out-takes in an attack upon yet another secret Nazi base, using bouncing bombs - this time bouncing along the ground would you believe?No; I didn't either.It is not very often that I actually squirm with embarrassment. But this was one such occasion.If you haven't already seen it, save yourselves. My DVD is serving as a coaster.