I had only the vaguest notion of where this phrase originated until I caught this film on the TCM tonight. God is not really anybody’s actual co-pilot here; the WWII fighters that Col. Robert Lee Scott flies are strictly single-seaters. But Scott (played by a non-descript Dennis Morgan who eerily anticipates Bob Crane’s irascible Klink-knocker in look and demeanor) finds religion in the skies, as he blasts the Japanese out of them.

Nothing too drastic plotwise or dialogwise here. The aerial combat footage (of which there is quite a bit), however, is stunning and entirely engaging. Watch out also for Alan Hale as the garrulous priest, eerily anticipating in look and demeanor his son, The Skipper.