Mosquito Squadron (1969)

This lacklustre low-budget effort combines elements of 633 Squadron (1964) – the plywood built De Havilland Mosquito fighter-bombers – with The Dam Busters (1955) – a bouncing bomb designed to destroy a top-secret German weapons facility – with a poor script and an unremarkable cast, although David McCallum – fresh from US television success in The Man From U.N.C.L.E – is in good form, although inexplicably playing a Canadian.

During a raid on rocket launching pads in France by the Mosquito Squadron, a group of Messerschmitts blow Squadron Leader David ‘Scotty’ Scott (David Buck) out of the sky.

Quint Munroe (McCallum) sees no parachute and assumes Scotty – a friend who was raised as a virtual brother – has copped it. Scotty’s death elevates Quint to Squadron Leader.

Scotty’s beautiful blonde widow, Beth (Suzanne Neve) is a former girlfriend of Quint’s, and after a reasonable period of mourning, Beth and Quint begin taking long bicycle rides in the country together.

The Germans are developing the V-3 rocket, and British Intelligence has located the site of their main laboratory at the Château de Charlon in France. Air Commodore Hufford (Charles Gray of The Rocky Horror Picture Show) assigns Quint and his squadron to bomb it with some new ordinance – a bomb that bounces on any terrain.

Discovering that the British are interested in Château de Charlon, the Germans drop a canister of film showing they have gathered British POWs at the Château as a human shield against bombing. Scotty is revealed to be among the prisoners but Quint is unable to tell Beth for security reasons.

Quint concocts a plan to destroy the V-3 laboratory in an underground facility with the bouncing bomb while also breaching the wall at the Château so the French Resistance can rescue the allied prisoners.

Quint and his Mosquito Squadron destroy the underground facility but Quint crashes and – once on the ground – runs into Scotty.

Unfortunately, Scotty has amnesia and cannot remember his own identity. He then sacrifices his life heroically by blowing up a German tank with a bazooka after several others have tried and failed.

A wounded Quint returns to England and reunites with Beth, who never learned that her late husband survived the crash only to die in France.

Most of the flying scenes were filmed at the airfield at RAF Bovingdon (now defunct) in Hertfordshire – the same location used for 633 Squadron and The Battle of Britain (1969) – although Mosquito Squadron actually re-uses a lot of footage lifted straight from 633 Squadron and Operation Crossbow (1965).

Watch out for uncredited performances from George Layton and Charles Lloyd Pack.

Quint Munroe
David McCallum
Beth Scott
Suzanne Neve
Air Commodore Hufford
Charles Gray
Sqn. Ldr. David ‘Scotty’ Scott
David Buck
Flt. Lieut. Douglas Shelton
David Dundas
Wing Commander Clyde Penrose
Dinsdale Landen
Flt. Sgt. Wiley Bunce
Nicky Henson
Sqn. Ldr. Neale
Bryan Marshall
Father Bellague
Michael Anthony
Mrs Scott
Peggy Thorpe-Bates
Mr Scott
Peter Copley
Lieutenant Schack
Vladek Sheybal
Flt. Lieutenant Bannister
Michael McGovern
Susan
Susan Brodrick

Director
Boris Sagal