For nearly a century, the U.S. military and Hollywood operated on an unspoken arrangement that benefited both sides. The Pentagon got favorable portrayals on the big screen. Studios got helicopters, aircraft carriers, and access to bases that no production budget could easily replicate. It looked like a perfect partnership — until, slowly, it didn’t.
Most people are unaware of how long the relationship has existed. The 1927 silent film Wings, about World War I fighter pilots, was made with direct Army support and won the very first Academy Award for Best Picture. That established a mood. With military approval, Patton won seven Oscars in 1970, decades later. Then, in 1986, the Navy released Top Gun, which, while not strictly speaking a recruiting tool, was arguably its most successful. The arrangement seemed unbreakable.
But something has been shifting — quietly, without a dramatic announcement or public falling-out. It’s not so much a clean break as it is a slow drift.
Part of it comes down to creative control. For every branch of the armed forces, the Department of Defense maintains liaison offices. These offices have always served two purposes: they assist filmmakers in telling truthful stories and ensure that sensitive data is kept secure. Production agreements require DoD review of rough cuts prior to release, according to Army Lt. Col. Tim Hyde, deputy director of the Los Angeles Office of the Chief of Public Affairs. That’s a big request. Some filmmakers eventually started to consider whether the editorial conflict was worth the access.
Hollywood’s desire for that conflict seems to have subtly decreased. Larger studios with bigger budgets can now source military-looking equipment, use digital environments, and construct their own sets without going through Washington. Over the past ten years, the difference between what the Pentagon provides and what technology can duplicate has significantly decreased. Production designers at Fort Hood, Texas, created more than 100 structures from the ground up when The Long Road Home needed to recreate Sadr City. Studios that prefer complete control over the frame are becoming more and more interested in that degree of creative flexibility.
Talk shows, documentaries, and game show episodes with military themes are examples of unscripted content that the DoD’s liaisons have shifted to. Coordination is still necessary and important. However, it’s a long way from creating the storyline of a big summer blockbuster. Since fewer productions are requesting the aircraft carrier in the first place, it has become more difficult to exert the kind of influence that was once standard when lending an aircraft carrier to a production crew.
The relationship may have contracted rather than ended. The Coast Guard, Air Force, Army, and Navy all still have offices in entertainment. However, the leverage has decreased. When filmmakers today want to tell a war story with moral ambiguity, a flawed commanding officer, or an ending that doesn’t land cleanly on the side of institutional confidence — they tend to find their own financing, their own locations, their own story.
Watching this unfold over the last several years, it’s hard not to read it as something more than a logistical shift. The cultural authority the U.S. military once held over how it was seen on screen was real, and it mattered. It shaped what war looked like for generations of audiences. That shaping is still happening — it’s just that fewer directors feel obligated to hand over that power in exchange for the use of a base in Georgia standing in for Texas.
The arrangement still exists. It’s simply not the only choice anymore. And for Hollywood, having options has always been everything.
