Review of Greyhound
Review by David Mattingly
Disclaimer, I never served on what we in the Navy referred to as “small boys or correctly referred to as destroyers. My time was on aircraft carriers or command ships and I never experienced the seas and winds of the North Atlantic I only watched them dip into the sea from the relative stability of my “bird farm.”
The only bad thing that I can say about Greyhound is that due to the Covid-19 Pandemic it was not released in a theater with the big screen and surround sound. My iPad at 0530 with a cup of coffee did not do the movie justice.
I feared from the first few minutes that the story was going to be wrapped in a love story as Commander Ernie Krause played by Tom Hanks meets his girlfriend in San Francisco. It is Christmas 1941 and the Navy has given him command of a Fletcher-class destroyer homeported in Norfolk. However, the writers used the scene to set the story but did not make the story the couple’s relationship.
From what appears as trivial tasks of a wartime ship’s captain repeating orders back and forth to the tension of making life and death decision while on the bridge perusing German U-Boats Hanks plays the role well and slips easily into the role of a sea captain wearing cold weather navy blues. Throughout the film, he plays the captain that a sailor would like to have served. From administering justice at Captain’s Mast to when the steward brings a tray of food to him on the bridge and sends the food to another officer “was probably hungry” he is a true skipper.
The low precision of shipboard electronics, ship’s radar, sonar, and communications make one wonder how we won the war. However, those are just tools, the skill and tactics of the officers and crew are what win wars. Hanks demonstrates that over and over as he leads his ship and the convoy to England.
I will not spoil the movie by talking about what happens as they cross the “black pit” the area past air coverage from the United States and before air coverage resumes from England. The movie only covers a short period of time, but you quickly realize the work and selfless sacrifice these sailors did in the name of democracy and freedom.
As a sailor historian that often critiques military movies for accuracy I have to admit on one watch of Greyhound I never said, “he wouldn’t say that or he isn’t wearing that correctly.”
If you do not have Apple+ I suggest you get it or find somebody that does. Greyhound is not the movie you want to miss this year.
Comment: This review was posted before review by my editor she is working her real job today. I wanted to get it posted ASAP. So sorry if I put a comma in the wrong place.
David Mattingly retired from the Navy as Master Chief Petty Officer and as a civilian senior intelligence officer in the U. S. Intelligence Community. He is a contributor to several military journals and a member of the Military Writers Guild.
