In May 1941 the Royal Navy was stretched to the breaking point. As was accurately pointed out by Laurence Naismith playing the First Sea Lord, they are committed heavily to the battle raging for Greece, to defending the critical base at Malta, and to protecting Atlantic convoys from America. So when Hitler turned loose his newest and biggest battleship, the Bismarck, the Royal Navy had not a whole lot to throw at her.
Sink the Bismarck is done in a documentary style with the action taking place on the high seas in the British ships and on the Bismarck. The other part of the drama takes place at the war room at the Admiralty where the fictitious character Kenneth More, a captain who had his ship shot out from under him by the German commander who is in charge of the Bismarck.
The Bismarck was only out for eight days, but in that time she annihilated the British cruiser Hood with all but 3 lost. After that it was a running battle with both planes from the carrier Ark Royal and ship to ship battles with the Prince of Wales, the George V, and the Dorcestshire before the Bismarck went down in the Atlantic.
There is a side personal drama involving Kenneth More whose son is a flier on board the Ark Royal and who is missing. WREN officer Dana Wynter is around to lend a sympathetic ear and there's a bit of a hint that things might get personal with More and Wynter.
The Ark Royal planes did some damage and I notice that the planes flown off the Ark Royal were ancient biplanes. They did some damage, but didn't sink the Bismarck themselves. Unfortunately some lessons were not learned by the British command and the Prince of Wales and the Repulse were sunk several months later by the Japanese with aerial bombardment when they reported for duty at the British base in Singapore. The British did in fact experiment with carriers as the Ark Royal's contribution in that action and others signifies. I'm willing to bet Mr. Churchill wished he had a few more carriers like the Americans and Japanese did. And I'm also willing to bet he was thanking the Deity the Germans had none.
Two things helped popularize the film in America and it did do well on this side of the Atlantic. I remember a packed house when I went to see it in theater back when I was a lad. One was the presence and narration of Edward R. Murrow who as a correspondent for CBS radio reported to America on the Bismarck story and so many others. His more than FDR's was the voice of World War II for the American public.
The second was that country singer Johnny Horton had a big selling hit also entitled Sink the Bismarck. Though nary a note of it is heard in this film that song on the charts boosted sales to Sink the Bismarck tremendously.
Kind of unusual that an American country singer would choose a British naval action as the subject of a song. But the heroism of all the members of the Royal Navy and even that of the crew of the Bismarck is the stuff legends are made of.
13 out of 16 found this helpful