Toward the Unknown

Toward the Unknown, originally called Flight Test Center and titled Brink of Hell in its UK release, is a 1956 American war film about the dawn of supersonic flight filmed on location at Edwards Air Force Base. Starring William Holden, Lloyd Nolan and Virginia Leith, the film features the screen debut of James Garner. Toward the Unknown was directed by Mervyn LeRoy and written by Beirne Lay, Jr. who had also penned the novel and screenplay for Twelve O'Clock High (1949), and later screenplays for Above and Beyond (1952) and Strategic Air Command (1955). The film's title is derived from the motto of the Air Force Flight Test Center, Ad Inexplorata. Plot USAF Major Lincoln Bond was captured during the Korean War and subjected to torture, finally cracking after 14 months and signing a confession used for propaganda. Upon his release, he took a year to recover from the ordeal before showing up at the Flight Test Center at Edwards Air Force Base, hoping to return to work as a test pilot. His old buddy, Colonel McKee, tries his best for him, but base commander Brigadier General Banner turns him down because he does not trust him to be stable. A complication is that the general's secretary and love interest, Connie Mitchell, is an old flame. Bond presses for a job and accepts the general's offer of routine flying in support. Banner is a hands-on leader, taking the most dangerous assignments himself. When Bond flies the new Gilbert XF-120 fighter, he finds dangerous structural problems that threaten its imminent acceptance by the Air Force. He claims he did not press the aircraft beyond its design specifications, but no one believes him, especially H. G. Gilbert, the head of the company that built the fighter. When the general tries to replicate Bond's maneuvers, nothing untoward happens. Afterward, Bond sees Banner nearly collapse in the locker room, but Banner shrugs off the incident.