March 25 - Men of Honor

Today’s movie is a biography with a scene that happens on March 25. I hope you will enjoy this film and watch it tonight.

MEN OF HONOR                              

Carl Bashear grows up in an African-American sharecropper’s family in Kentucky who have hard times since he goes to school at the insistence of his father instead of working. He joins the navy and works as a cook. He is impressed by the bravery and dedication of  Master Diver ‘Billy’ Sunday and determines to become one himself. After two years he is accepted to the Navy’s Dive and Salvage school, where he finds Sunday is the chief instructor, who unbeknownst to Brashear is under orders to fail him because he is an African-American..  Brashear does well in the technical aspects of the course but nearly fails the academic portion until he meets his future wife, an aspiring doctor, who helps him. Brashaer experiences racism first hand. For example when he rescues a student after a training accident, a fellow student who fled the scene gets a medal instead of Bashear. During his final exam, to assemble a flange underwater, his tool bag is cut spilling his tools all over the bottom. However, he finds the tools and completes the assignment, earning the unvoiced but obvious admiration of Sunday and his heretofore hostile fellow students. Sunday is demoted for allowing Brashear to pass and with his hot temper gets demoted further when he fights with those who disrespect him. When an atomic bomb is lost off Palomares, Spain Brashear finds one of them but his leg is partially crushed as it is brought on board on March 25, 1966. [1:30:40 to 1:31:31:55] He has the leg amputated so he can wear a prosthesis and return to duty. The same officer who opposed Sunday now stands in his way, but a review hearing he establishes his fitness and returns to duty.   

A good biopic. Not too overly romanticized. Plenty of exciting moments.  The story of this American hero is well worth watching.

The Reminiscences of Master Chief Boatswain’s Mate Carl M. Brashear by Carl M. Brashear (U.S. Naval Institute, Annapolis, MD, 1998) at page 83 gives the date of his accident.

Director - George Tillman, Jr.

Producer - Bill Badalato, Robert Teitel

Screenplay - Scott Marshall Smith

Released - November 10, 2000

Runtime – 2 hours 9 minutes

Starring -

Robert De Niro as Chief Petty Officer Leslie William 'Billy' Sunday

Cuba Gooding, Jr. as Senior Chief Petty Officer Carl Brashear

Charlize Theron as  Gwen Sunday

Aunjanue Ellis as  Jo Brashear

Hal Holbrook as Captain  'Mr. Pappy'

Copyright by Ivan Walters 2014.