Handlung

In 1923, two Tennessee boys, Rafe McCawley and Danny Walker, pretend to be fighter pilots in a crop duster. They are very good friends & want to fight the dirty Germans (fallout of WW1). Rafe is uneducated and is always very protective of Danny. He even saves Danny from his abusive father (William Fichtner).

By 1940, as grown men, Rafe (Ben Affleck) and Danny (Josh Hartnett) are First Lieutenants in the United States Army Air Corps under the command of Major Jimmy Doolittle (Alec Baldwin). Doolittle doesn't like that Danny and Rafe goof around in a $45,000 airplane. But he admires Rafe for the way he inspires the men and offers him the option of going to Europe and serving in the war. Doolittle cannot order Rafe, as the US is not at War, so Rafe volunteers.

Rafe meets Evelyn Johnson (Kate Beckinsale), a Navy nurse who passes him for his physical examination even though he has dyslexia (after Rafe makes a passionate plea about why he is going to be the best pilot in the US and begs her not to take his wings away), and is instantly smitten. The two soon begin dating and fall in love. Four weeks later, Rafe and Evelyn, now deeply in love, enjoy an evening of dancing at a nightclub and later a jaunt in the New York harbor in a borrowed police boat. Rafe shocks Evelyn by saying that he has joined the Eagle Squadron and is leaving the next day. Before Rafe leaves for England, he makes a promise to Evelyn that he will come back for her. Evelyn and Danny are transferred with their respective squadrons to Pearl Harbor. At the time, Pearl Harbor is considered to be the safest posting possible, and as far as away from the fighting as it can be. The US policy is to cannibalize the Pacific fleet and supply the ships and airplanes to British and Russians to fight the Nazis. Admiral Husband E. Kimmel (Colm Feore), is the commander-in-chief of the United States Fleet and the U.S. Pacific Fleet. Pearl Harbor is considered too shallow for an aerial torpedo attack and the base itself is surrounded by submarine nets.

Evelyn serves at the Tripler Army Hospital with fellow nurses Betty (Jaime King), Barbara (Catherine Kellner), Sandra (Jennifer Garner) and Martha (Sara Rue). Danny serves at the Wheeler Airfield with Billy Thompson (William Lee Scott), Red Winkle (Ewen Bremner), Anthony Fusco (Greg Zola), Gooz Wood (Michael Shannon), Joe McKinnon (Matt Davis) and lead aircraft mechanic Sergeant Earl Sistern (Tom Sizemore). Rafe serves with the British Eagles squadron with Ian (Tony Curran) and Royal Air Force Squadron leader (Nicholas Farrell). Petty Officer Second Class Doris Miller (Cuba Gooding Jr.), is a cook aboard the USS West Virginia.

Rafe is shot down over the English Channel and presumed killed in action. 3 months later, Evelyn and Danny bond over their mourning for Rafe and unexpectedly develop feelings for each other. 3 months later they begin their own relationship and eventually have sex.

Meanwhile, Japan prepares to attack the US Pacific Fleet, deciding the best way to do so would be a decisive strike on the Pearl Harbor naval base. The attack is planned by Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto (Mako), Fleet Admiral of the Imperial Japanese Navy and Commander Minoru Genda (Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa). The US has cut off Japan's oil supply from Southeast Asia, so they have no option but to go to war.

Takeo Yoshikawa (Seth Sakai) is the Japanese spy in Pearl Harbor. Takeo takes detailed pictures of the entire base and sends them to the Japanese military for planning purposes. The Japanese fix wooden fins to the torpedoes to travel in shallow waters. Captain Harold Thurman (Dan Aykroyd), is a US Naval Intelligence officer overseeing the monitoring of Japanese espionage efforts. As near as November 29, Naval intelligence had no clue about the location of the Japanese carrier strike groups. Thurman believes that the fleet is headed to Pearl Harbor. Admiral Chester W. Nimitz (Graham Beckel) refuses to mobilize the Pacific Fleet based on an intuition and demands hard facts. On 5th December, US intelligence intercepts a call from Tokyo to a Japanese dentist at Pearl Harbor to inquire about the weather and the location of the US carriers.

On the night of December 6, 1941, Rafe unexpectedly returns, having survived the crash, and been stranded in occupied France in the interval. He quickly realizes that Evelyn and Danny are now together. Feeling hurt and betrayed, the two friends soon get into a fight at the local hula bar. When military police arrive, they flee the scene to avoid being put in the brig and fall asleep in Danny's car.

The next morning, on December 7, they are interrupted by the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor by Zero fighters, Val dive bombers and Kate torpedo bombers. The radar station at Pearl picks up the incoming planes but mistakes it for a scheduled flight of the B-17s coming from the mainland. Just before the attack, Tokyo messages their embassy in Washington to destroy all decoding machines and destroy secret documents, signaling imminent war.

The surprise Japanese air raid sinks the battleships USS Arizona, USS Oklahoma and many other ships. The bombers also take out the main airfields protecting the Harbor. Danny takes Rafe to one of the training airfields, which has not been bombed by the Japanese. The USS Oklahoma is capsized due to repeated torpedo attacks and sailors are trapped inside, alive, who eventually drown in a watery grave. Back at the hospital, Evelyn helps tend to the dozens of wounded who come in and must help decide who can and cannot be saved. Evelyn saves the life of Major Jackson (Leland Orser) a USAAC officer.

Meanwhile, Rafe and Danny are the only two who manage to get airborne and shoot down 7 Japanese aircraft with P-40s using their reckless tactics, including an old game of theirs called chicken. The Japanese call off the 3rd wave of their attack as they do not have the element of surprise.

The two men then go to the hospital, where Evelyn takes blood from them for the hundreds of injured soldiers, and later aid in trying to rescue the many men still in the harbor. In the aftermath, the survivors attend a memorial service for the fallen victims after the U.S. declaration of war on Japan. Over 3000 American lives were lost in the attack.

The next day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt (Jon Voight) delivers his Day of Infamy speech to the nation and requests that the US Congress declare a state of war with the Empire of Japan.

Rafe and Danny are both promoted to Captain, awarded the Silver Star and assigned to now-Colonel Doolittle for a dangerous and top-secret mission. The mission was authorized by Roosevelt to strike at the heart of Japan. President Franklin D. Roosevelt wants to send a message that the Japanese homeland is not immune from bombing. The US has long range bombers, but no place to launch them from. The Admirals are reluctant to assign the carriers as without the carriers there is no protection against invasion. It is a submarine commander who comes up with the idea to bomb Japan using the carriers and the long-range bombers. During the next three months, Rafe, Danny and other pilots train for ultra-short takeoffs with specially modified B-25 Mitchell bombers. The carriers are exactly 467 feet long. Lieutenant Jack Richards (Kim Coates), a United States Naval Aviator is in charge of making the planes lighter.

Before their departure in March 1942, Evelyn meets Rafe and reveals that she is pregnant with Danny's child, although she doesn't want Danny to know so he can focus on the upcoming mission. She says that she is going to remain with Danny, though deep down she will always love Rafe just as much.

Danny, Rafe and others are to fly B-25 Mitchell medium bombers from the aircraft carrier USS Hornet on Apr 18th, 1942, bomb Tokyo and some Japanese occupied territory in China. Major Jackson allows Evelyn to sit in the operations room to hear how the raid is going, as a thank you for saving his life. The carriers are discovered 642 miles from the Japanese coast, when the plan was to launch from 400 miles away. Doolittle removes all machine guns from the planes and gives the gunners broomsticks painted black to resemble a gun. Each plane is given an extra 10 cans of fuel to make it to China. The two men succeed in their bombing but crash land into a rice field in China when their bombers run out fuel and are captured by the Japanese who run towards the crash site. Just as Rafe is about to be shot, Danny knocks the soldiers over and is instead shot himself while the other American crew mates fight off the remaining soldiers. Rafe holds a dying Danny in his arms, telling him he can't die because he's going to be a father. With his dying words, Danny tells Rafe to raise his child for him.

The film ends a few years later with Rafe and Evelyn, who are together again, and their son, Danny (biologically Danny's son), back at the farm in Tennessee visiting Danny Walker's grave. Rafe then takes his son flying, and the two fly off into the sunset in the old biplane.