History Film / TheDamBusters

[[quoteright:350:http://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/dambustersposter_7801.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:350:Calling T for Troper!]]

The story of the Dam Busters is one which brings out several features of the British - the sophistication of their engineering innovation, the bravery of their armed forces, the incompetence of their leaders and their unerring ability to be first in a technical field and then leave it to others to make money out of it (for example, see Babbage and Turing...or Whittle...)

Barnes Wallis came up with the idea of making a 5 ton spinning bomb which would skip across the water, hit the dam wall, then sink to the bottom before exploding. Thus the water itself would focus the force of the blast against the dam's wall, in much the same way that a good torpedo hit causes more damage to a ship's hull than would an equivalent amount of explosives in a bomb or artillery shell. These were duly made in a tearing hurry and delivered by a crack team flying Lancasters in pitch darkness 60ft over water, nearly half of whom did not come back. The bombs worked, though the most important dam survived.

Having suffered almost 50% losses for disappointing results, the British mothballed the bouncing-bomb concept and never attacked the dams again, letting the Germans rebuild them. Barnes Wallis was allowed to develop his 'earth penetrator' bombs which were staggeringly effective - taking out bridges and viaducts, sinking the Tirpitz, stopping the V2 and V3 developments, destroying U-boat pens at Brest with 33ft reinforced concrete roofs and in one attack, and blowing up a railway line which ran under a mountain by dropping the bomb THROUGH the mountain and into the tunnel beneath.

Notable for its influence on a little movie called StarWars: the trench run was heavily inspired by the climax of the film. Several lines of dialogue are actually re-used, nearly verbatim.

* MadScientist: Barnes Wallis, whilst not actually mad (even though some of his inventions were seen that way), was certainly as prolific as the archetype - he invented geodetic frames for aircraft, designed airships and aeroplanes, the bouncing and earthquake bombs, and after the war worked on swing-wing and supersonic aircraft, rocket-propelled torpedos, and even came up with designs for cargo submarines that were faster and more efficient than comparable surface ships.

** The original scene is in ''TheWall'' when Pink is freaking out in his hotel room.

** Referenced in ''TheOffice'' (UK).

* StrollingThroughTheChaos: Gibson during the aformentioned riot. Avoids a chair, a pair of pants and several airmen (though he does stop to deck a man who's double-teaming one of his own men).

Barnes Wallis came up with the idea of making a 5 ton spinning bomb which would skip across the water, hit the dam wall, then sink to the bottom before exploding. These were duly made in a tearing hurry and delivered by a crack team flying Lancasters in pitch darkness 60ft over water, nearly half of whom did not come back. The bombs worked, though the most important dam survived.

->'''Official''': ''You say you need a Wellington Bomber for test drops. They're worth their weight in gold. [[ObstructiveBureaucrat Do you really think the authorities will lend you one? What possible argument could I put forward to get you a Wellington?]]''
->'''[[GadgeteerGenius Barnes Wallis]]''': ''[[DeadpanSnarker Well, if you told them I designed it, do you think that might help?]]''

* AirstrikeImpossible

[[caption-width-right:350:some caption text]]

--> '''Barnes Wallis:''' Well, if you told them I designed it, do you think that might help?

--> '''Barnes Wallace:''' If I'd known it was going to be like this, I'd never have started.

--> '''Barnes Wallace:''' Well, if you told them I designed it, do you think that might help?

* DownerEnding

'''The movie is a classic and contains examples of:'''

* EarWorm : along with TheGreatEscape , the unofficial anthem of football fans, a standard for military marching bands and certainly one if the best remembered film themes ever

* CrowningMusicOfAwesome : along with TheGreatEscape , the unofficial anthem of football fans, a standard for military marching bands and certainly one if the best remembered film themes ever

* CrowningMusicOfAwesome : along with TheGreatEscape , the unofficial anthem of football fans

* CrowningMusicOfAwesome : practically the TropeNamer

Notable for its influence on a little movie called StarWars: the trench run was heavily inspired by the climax of the film.

** The book makes it quite clear: This only worked because ''nobody had ever tried anything like this before'', so none of the generally simple and easy to build defenses that would have made it completely impossible were in place.

* [[BarRoomBrawl Mess Room Brawl]]: While waiting for conditions to be perfect for the raid, 617 Sqdn members got teases a lot by the members of other squadrons at RAF Scampton. After Gibson allows them to let off steam, one of these occurs.

* StrollingThroughTheChaos: Gibson during the aformentioned riot. Avoids a chair, a pair of pants and several airmen.

* DidNotDoTheResearch: There are some historical inaccuracies. The ones concerning the bomb's size and shape don't count though as the details were still classified at the time so they had to leave out many of the details, including a mechanism used to give the bomb "backspin" to ensure it bounced properly.
** When it says classified, it means as in 'Would not tell the writer'.
** Additionally the film makes it look as if it was Wallis's idea. In fact the Government had been looking at ways to destroy those dams since 1936 - The British Government had known for at least 3 years before Poland that war was coming.
** The two search light method for determining height was worked out by a Civil Servant, not by Gibson going to the ballet.
** Also the scenes of a GiantWallOfWateryDoom smashing German heavy industry -- most of those killed were Allied prisoners in a POW camp, and the effect on the German war effort was minimal because the second dam was not destroyed.

** Also the scenes of a giant wall of water smashing German industries -- most of those killed were Allied prisoners in a POW camp, and the effect on the German war effort was minimal because the second dam was not destroyed.

* AwesomeButImpractical: The weapon itself, though the film downplays this. It was a very effective piece of technology but almost suicidally dangerous to deploy, requiring a heavy bomber to fly in a perfectly straight line at treetop height. The bombs also tended to disintegrate when used over land and rebound unpredictably in choppy sea-states, so they were only really useful for this one specific job, and Germany didn't have all that many dams worth attacking.