I have been a researcher of the Battle of Britain all my life. I have dozens of books on the subject, from "The Narrow Margin", a tome which was used as the basis of the 1969 film, "The Battle of Britain", to many individual accounts, including Ginger Lacey, Geoffrey Wellum, Tom Neil, etc. It was the film which set my life in its direction, and I subsequently served 30 years in the RAF, as Aircrew.
I also read the 303 Squadron book. It was very clear from early on in this film that no one of importance in the making of it had ever read the book, nor had they watched the quintessential film of the era, "The Battle of Britain". Had they done so, the pilots in the aerial sequences would not have appeared zombie-like, and the painfully slow manoeuvring of the computer-generated aircraft would have been rejected. I know they hadn't read the book, because if they had, they would surely have included an incident a few days after the squadron became operational, when their huge successes were initially disbelieved. A senior RAF officer followed them up on a scramble to see for himself. His report went along the lines of, "I don't know where they learned to fly like that, but it wasn't the RAF....I've never seen flying or fighting like that in my life. In the future, if they claim 10 kills, you had better believe them." The script was too modern, with many millennial phrases, the character of Phyllis (played by the lovely Stefanie Martini) insisted on strutting around in uniform with her hair down (never allowed, not even up to the present day), and appeared to be connected to some communications network far removed to the one she should have been monitoring in the plotting room. In reality, all she would have heard were simple instructions, like, "303 sqn, square E17", etc, and she would have moved the plot of the squadron to that square on the grid. This is a true story which should have been told much sooner than this, and it is a shame that they made such a mess of making the film. To anyone who wants to see a simple shoot-em-up, no doubt the film will suffice, but to anyone who cares about the past, it is a travesty.
I also read the 303 Squadron book. It was very clear from early on in this film that no one of importance in the making of it had ever read the book, nor had they watched the quintessential film of the era, "The Battle of Britain". Had they done so, the pilots in the aerial sequences would not have appeared zombie-like, and the painfully slow manoeuvring of the computer-generated aircraft would have been rejected. I know they hadn't read the book, because if they had, they would surely have included an incident a few days after the squadron became operational, when their huge successes were initially disbelieved. A senior RAF officer followed them up on a scramble to see for himself. His report went along the lines of, "I don't know where they learned to fly like that, but it wasn't the RAF....I've never seen flying or fighting like that in my life. In the future, if they claim 10 kills, you had better believe them." The script was too modern, with many millennial phrases, the character of Phyllis (played by the lovely Stefanie Martini) insisted on strutting around in uniform with her hair down (never allowed, not even up to the present day), and appeared to be connected to some communications network far removed to the one she should have been monitoring in the plotting room. In reality, all she would have heard were simple instructions, like, "303 sqn, square E17", etc, and she would have moved the plot of the squadron to that square on the grid. This is a true story which should have been told much sooner than this, and it is a shame that they made such a mess of making the film. To anyone who wants to see a simple shoot-em-up, no doubt the film will suffice, but to anyone who cares about the past, it is a travesty.