So Proudly We Hail!

So Proudly We Hail! is a 1943 American war film directed and produced by Mark Sandrich and starring Claudette Colbert, Paulette Goddard – who was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress for her performance – and Veronica Lake. Also featuring George Reeves, it was produced and released by Paramount Pictures. The film follows a group of military nurses sent to the Philippines during the early days of World War II. The movie was based on a book written by Lieutenant Colonel Juanita Hipps, a World War II nurse – one of the "Angels of Bataan" – who served in Bataan and Corregidor during the time when MacArthur withdrew to Australia which ultimately led to the surrender of US and Philippine troops to Japanese forces. Those prisoners of war were subjected to the Bataan Death March. The film was also based, in part, on Hipps's memoir I Served on Bataan. Plot The film begins with a group of several nurses arriving in Australia, having been some of the few evacuated before the Japanese captured their base. One of them is Janet "Davey" Davidson, who wanted to stay and fainted at the start of the evacuation and remains in a coma. An officer asks the other nurses to describe their journey up to that point, beginning a flashback. The flashback begins in California, as the girls prepare to set off for the Philippines. Joan, another nurse, is revealed to have two fiancés because she can't say no to a man. Davey covers for her by stopping the two from figuring out her relationship, and the nurses quickly get on the boat. The war begins as they go to Hawaii, and the boat is rerouted to the Philippines. One of the boats in the convoy is also sunk, with survivors being taken aboard the nurse's boat. One is Olivia, who is very rude and uncaring towards her fellow nurses. On the boat Davey meets John Summers, a soldier who she initially dislikes. They come to like one another over time. Joan meets a man called Kansas, a marine who initially seems nervous. The ship has a party to celebrate Christmas, where Joan and Kansas dance as well as Davey and John. After a fight, Olivia reveals she was supposed to get married that day. However, her husband was killed in the Attack on Pearl Harbor. Since then, she has sworn to kill as many Japanese as possible.