Paramount has got itself a $2 picture. In fact, the most legitimate of the species it has had since "The Covered Wagon." The air stuff in this one is going to keep it at the Criterion a long time, and they're going to turn out for it when it takes to the road. "Wings" is there.This super is not just a $2 entry for Manhattan. It's a road show -- on the strength of that air stuff, a combination of beautiful flying and great camera work. There are thrills and a couple of gasps in it. When the action settles on terra firma there is nothing present that other war supers haven't had, some to a greater degree. But nothing has possessed the graphic descriptive powers of aerial flying and combat that have been poured into this effort. All of which will carry the 12,600 feet of film currently being unloaded for the populace twice daily. Try and get in -- for awhile, anyway.
And the picture is being staged. Midway in the first part the switch is made to Paramount's Magnascope, which spreads the screen and projection across the entire stage. This is retained until the finish of the first half. The same thing occurs in the second part, so that much more than half the footage is magnified. More effective than in either "Ironsides" or "Chang," because of the terrific action. Add to that backstage effects simulating the whine and drone of the motors, in two tones to denote the American and enemy planes, with the music abruptly halting every so often to allow full dramatic intensity, and the result will get under anybody's skin.
This high altitude war game has been given plenty of technical attention from actual "shooting" to presentation. The total on this phase speaks for itself and the rewards will be heavy.
Some of the Magnascope battle scenes in the air are in color. Not natural but with sky and clouds deftly tinted plus spouts of flame shooting from planes that dive, spiral and even zoom as they supposedly plunge to earth in a final collapse. Automatic cameras (reported to be mostly Devrye) have registered the personal equasion of what goes on inside a cockpit of a falling plane. Some of these shots of aviators dying with their planes going out of control are realistic enough to make a house "freeze." Who these boys are isn't known. They're not the main characters in the story, just individuals of a combat group pictured as both American and German, all fighting.
Rolls, dives, slips, loops. They're all there. Spectacular enough without the added constructive potion of make believe that signifies the urge for self-preservation. Manoueuvers that the average person has never seen performed in the air, space eaten up so fast that there's no calculating the rate it's consumed at, beside the jockeying of the planes to get on each other's "tail" before pouring out their stream of lead. So much to see that it actually can't be minutely consumed at one viewing.
Trench warfare and tank action, too. All on a big scale and well done, but secondary to the airplanes.
The story? An average tale. And yet it was human enough Friday night to make 90 per cent of the women in the house cry. The director, Wellman, can take credit for that, as the tale is laid out for but one situation: that of the American flyer, John, unknowingly shooting down his pal, David, after the latter has escaped from behind the enemy lines in a German plane. John discovers what he has done when David's machine crashes.
What seems to have more power is Wellman's depiction of David's (Richard Arlen) departure from his family for training camp. The director is ably abetted in this by the cast membership of Arlen, Henry Walthall and Julia Swayne Gordon. Both Walthall and Miss Gordon are again histrionically prominent during the anti-climax footage when John (Charles Rogers) comes home to deliver his dead friend's decoration and mascot to the bereaved parents.
Arlen, incidentally, has gone through the picture minus make-up. At least the cameras register him that way. Consequently he looks the high bred, high strung youngster who would dote on aviation and backs it up with a splendid performance that never hints of the actor. Rogers' effort is also first rate, the important point here being that these two boys team well together.
There not being so much of Clara Bow in the picture, or a straining for her to turn on that "it" personality, she gives an all around corking performance. The way the film unwinds it's a sure thing this girl has been cut out of a lot of time on the screen. El Brendel's comedy is spasmodic and mostly early in the first half, while Gary Cooper is on and off within half a reel. Jobyna Ralston only crops up occasionally but is significant in the love theme, as both boys love her. An accidental incident makes John believe he is favored when it is David whom she cares for, and David knows. Clara (Miss Bow) having worshipped John from afar throughout the picture finally gets him, and that winds up the unreeling. Other players listed are relegated to what amount to bits.
The most planes counted in the air at once are 18. But there are the pursuit and bombing machines captive balloons, smashes and crashes of all types, with some of the shots of these "crack-ups" remarkable. Fake stuff and double photography, too, although no miniatures in regard to the air action are discernible if used. The bombing of targets, in this case a French village, is familiar through the newsreels, but John is shown coming down in his machine to spray infantry, wreck a general's automobile by killing its occupants with his dual guns besides destroying a couple of captive balloons.
Probably the standout of the crashes rests between the destruction of a giant bomber and the shooting down of a plane that isn't more than 20 feet in the air as it takes off. How they got the latter shot will likely keep those interested guessing for some time.
No preliminary stalling, the story being down to cases and working up interest at the end of 10 minutes. Training camp stuff is quickly dispensed with and the two boys are overseas and on their initial dawn patrol, where the first and best air fight of the picture takes place, before the screening is much more than half an hour old. Musically the score is not as stirring as that for some of the other war supers.
When "Wings" was pre-viewed in San Antonio last spring it was in 14 reels, and that aviation-mad town went off its collective head about it. It is understood that the criterion showing has been curtailed to 12,600 feet, and may soon lose some more of its yardage.
To be a genuine road show a picture must be vital and of universal appeal. The industry, to date, has known just six of these, namely: "Birth of a Nation," "Way Down East," "The Ten Commandments," "The Covered Wagon," "The Big Parade," and "Ben-Hur." Irrespective of the wave of interest in aviation that is currently sweeping the world, add "Wings" to that list. Because its flying is vital.
Sid.
1927/1928: Outstanding Picture (Paramount Famous Lasky), Engineering Effects
