November 9, 2010, Howser released a music video of his performance of "California, Here I Come" on Los Angeles public-television station KCET. In film In the 1934 W. C. Fields film It's a Gift, a record of the song is shown on-screen and the Victrola needle is put down to play it. The recording then plays over the next scene, showing the Bissonette family packing for their trip to the West Coast. Al Jolson sings it in the musical film Rose of Washington Square (1939). The song is featured as the main title theme of the 1945 motion picture Back to Bataan, starring John Wayne and Anthony Quinn. It was the Victory March of the US Sixth Army, which played a major role in the liberation of the Philippine Islands. The Sixth Army, formerly the Army of the Pacific, was based in California with its headquarters at the Presidio near San Francisco. In the 1980 movie The Shining, while freezing and losing his verbal coherency in the hedge maze, some believe Jack Nicholson recites part of the song at one point. In the 1981 Burt Reynolds and Dom DeLuise comedy The Cannonball Run, the Doctor (portrayed by Jack Elam) musses the chorus in the background during a discussion. In what is arguably the most ironic appearance of the song in popular culture, in the 2003 Canadian film The Saddest Music in the World, the song is played by the American team in the final round of the competition (against Serbia), by a multicultural orchestra consisting of violins, sitar, and Romanian panpipes. Other cultural references The song was played by the ship's band of the aircraft carrier USS Yorktown (CV-5) as the ship steamed from Pearl Harbor to participate in the Battle of Midway. The song may have been intended as a deception, as the severely outnumbered American forces depended on surprise to gain an advantage in the battle. Japanese agents seeing the Yorktown departing would hopefully conclude that it was steaming for the mainland rather than to Midway. The song is the theme song for California's Gold. The song is played in the classic Sierra game Gold Rush! as the ship carrying fortune seekers comes to port in Sacramento. Richard Nixon, in a set of instructions he left in case he were to die in office, directed that "California, Here I Come" should be played "softly and slowly" at his