'Devotion' director Dillard has higher goals for Tom Hudner's story than another war movie

The story of Navy Capt. Thomas Hudner Jr. and Ensign Jesse Brown is a tale of selflessness and heroism, the kind that has sustained military brotherhood for untold generations: one man putting himself at risk of mortal danger to save another.

To filmmaker J.D. Dillard, their story goes deeper — it’s about understanding.

Dillard is the director of “Devotion,” a war film produced by Sony Pictures now in theaters that tells the extraordinary story of Hudner and Brown on scales both epic and subtle. Playing Fall River native Tom Hudner is Glen Powell (“Hidden Figures,” “Top Gun: Maverick”), alongside star Jonathan Majors as Brown (“Loki,” “Lovecraft Country,” “Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania”).

“On every account these were both great men," Dillard said in an interview with The Herald News. "We really centered ‘Devotion’ on a story of mutual understanding. Because that’s something that doesn’t really alter the legacy of these individuals but lets them dramatically explore some of the bigger themes of what it means to be there for one another — what it means to be a wingman, and an ally, and a friend.”

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'The character in the cockpit'

Brown was born into desperate poverty in Mississippi in 1926, and followed a dream to fly. It was an age when white America had not yet owned up to the shame of racial segregation. Brown, a studious and driven man, overcame obstacles placed in his path by bigotry and injustice to become the first Black aviator to complete the Navy’s basic flight training program. While serving as a Navy combat pilot, he met Hudner, a white Fall River native, and the two became friends.

On Dec. 4, 1950, while fighting in the Korean War in what would become known as the Battle of Chosin Reservoir, Brown’s aircraft was shot down behind enemy lines in deep snow. Seeing Brown still alive in the burning wreckage and waving for help, Hudner intentionally crash-landed his plane and ran to his side to try to free him — but was unsuccessful. Brown died in Korea that day, his remains never recovered. President Harry S. Truman presented Hudner with the Medal of Honor, the military's highest award.

The story resonates with Dillard, whose father was a Naval flight officer and the second Black man picked to fly with the famed Blue Angels exhibition team. Dillard had been looking to tell a story set in the aviation world.

“I’ve always been obsessed with the character in the cockpit, and wanted to find some way to play with that iconography,” he said.

A script based on Adam Makos’ biography of Hudner and Brown, “Devotion,” landed on his desk. “When I read the script for the first time, it dawned on me that I heard Jesse’s name before but not his story," Dillard said. He also recognized "a lot of overlap” between Brown’s story and his father’s.

“I was so overwhelmed reading the script for the first time, because I just couldn’t imagine that all of this had happened, what transpired between him and Tom," Dillard said. “It just seemed larger than life and stranger than fiction in a way.

“When I read to the end of the script, I was like, ‘I think I need to be a part of this.’”

Learning to be a wingman

"Devotion” features plenty of sky-high action built for the big screen, but Dillard keeps the focus on Hudner and Brown, two men from vastly different backgrounds who formed an abiding friendship. He drew on conversations with both families, and research from Herald News archives from the 1950s, to depict the two men in a way that’s true to life but dramatic — a nuanced and rich story of male friendship, race, and empathy.

“Tom and Jesse have slightly different north stars," Dillard said. “On Jesse’s end, what was ultimately a superpower was also the thing that isolated him, and that was his discernment. Jesse survived by being slow to trust in so many ways, knowing that not everyone had his best interest at hand.

“Tom is quite eager to do the right thing, be the right person, but starts to learn that the wingman that he is for everyone else does not necessarily work for Jesse — and that there are ways he has to show up for Jesse, in very specific ways, to be there for him given who he is and the circumstances in which he lives.”

That sense of being present for each other, and slowly learning what your partner needs from you, is at the heart of "Devotion,” Dillard said. It makes the film not just another story of friendship forged in battle but, as the title indicates, a story about love — for country, family, and each other — and about what it’s like to give your entire self to someone else.

“The more nuanced look is actually how difficult it really can be to be there for someone in the ways that they need you," Dillard said. "The needs of that person can be quite specific. And tied to that, you never want to be there for someone in a way that takes away their own agency.”

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Hudner and Brown forever linked

Hudner, who died in 2017 at age 93, spent decades remaining in contact with Brown’s family, and despite receiving the nation’s highest military honor had more than once said he never considered his actions heroic. Before he received the award, Hudner was, in fact, initially reprimanded for putting himself and a rescue helicopter in further danger.

“Jesse would have done the same for me,” Hudner told reporters at the time he received the medal. 

“What Tom did was such an incredible thing, an absolutely astounding act — but the true-to-life part of it, we felt, was you could do that thing without necessarily being someone’s best friend," Dillard said, noting that the men had, in the course of their military service, been ingrained with a sense of duty and selflessness. "Devotion" is about something more.

“All Jesse and Tom have to do in the course of the film is understand each other, and that actually speaks louder than anything else.”

"Devotion" is now playing at Picture Show in Fall River, AMC in Dartmouth, Showcase Cinemas in Seekonk, Providence Place Cinemas, and other theaters nationwide.

Dan Medeiros can be reached at dmedeiros@heraldnews.com. Support local journalism by purchasing a digital or print subscription to The Herald News today.

This article originally appeared on The Herald News: 'Devotion' director Dillard: How Hudner learned to be Brown's wingman