BEFORE: Now entering Round 4 of the (M)Archie Madness Tournament, just a few more days to go. Of course, Cary Grant made over 70 films so there's no way I can watch them all in just 3 weeks, so my work will always seem incomplete. But let's get to Round 4, which was intended to be about the military, but I realize now that this film has nothing to do with wartime pilots, but just regular pilots instead. Oh, well.
THE PLOT: At a remote South American trading port, the manager of an air freight company is forced to risk his pilots' lives in order to win an important contract.
AFTER: This film covers the complexities of running a cargo service near the Andes Mountains, working out of the fictional port of Barranca. Whether the planes are carrying the mail, or serving as air ambulances, or delivering nitroglycerin to oil fields (I'm not sure why one would do that, it seems like carrying a torch into a hay barn...) the one thing we learn is that flying these planes is muy peligroso.
Almost as dangerous is being in love with one of these hotshot pilots, because a girl never knows if her man is coming back or not. I have to acknowledge the accidental timing of watching this film just a few days after a German plane crashed in France, but darn if it doesn't seem like we've had a number of prominent plane crashes and disappearances in the last couple of years. And you wonder why I never fly, unless I have to? We've got people working on developing driverless cars, with the noble goal of reducing traffic accidents to zero, why isn't anyone working on safer air travel? I hate the way humans just invent things that are inherently dangerous and then say, "That's it, we're done! No way we can improve on that!" What about fuel that won't explode, or planes that bounce, or can't be tracked by missiles, or won't sink into the ocean? I'm spitballing here, of course, and I'm not saying those ideas are feasible, but let's keep thinking of new ideas, damn it!!
This almost turned into another dreaded love triangle, when one boat brought a woman who falls for Cary Grant, despite his risky lifestyle and desire to not settle down (I bet all that just makes him more attractive to women, curse him...) and then a later boat brings his ex-girlfriend, who's married to the latest pilot recruit. Said recruit has a bad reputation, as he once bailed out of a plane, leaving behind the brother of another pilot, but to regain his reputation, he's willing to take the riskiest flights through the most dangerous weather conditions. Geez, if the terrain is so rough and the weather is so bad in this area, why the heck did someone open an air freight company there? Wouldn't a delivery service of burros, like a South American Pony Express, make more sense?
As I've mentioned before, one of the down sides of having gone to film school is that I often need to figure out how certain film effects were achieved. During last night's film, I needed to figure out how they made Mae West look like a lion tamer. In some shots they used rear projection of lion footage, and I'm guessing that when she put her head in the lion's mouth, they used a fake lion's head. Oh, it looked plenty real, but there was a noticeable cut just before and just after her head appeared to be in danger. Tonight's investigation of special effects concerns the planes taking off and landing on this remote stretch of runway - something didn't look 100% kosher to me, and I'll wager they used scale model planes on wires, though I didn't see any wires.
Hmm, I guess I'm wrong, because Wikipedia only mentions the real planes that were used for the long-shots, and doesn't make any mention of model planes. No, wait, I found a web-page where someone mentioned the 2008 appraisal on "Antiques Roadshow" of a miniature plane used in the filming of "Only Angels Have Wings". It just makes sense - why would someone crash a real plane for a film when they can crash a model much more cheaply and safely?
A lot of the dialogue feels forced, however, because of something I call "Who, me?" syndrome. This is a cheap way to lengthen scenes by having every actor question the line before, rather than move on in the conversation. Example: "I want to talk to you about something." "Who, me?" "Umm, yes, you're the only other person here. Did you talk to Ted?" "Who, me?" You get the idea.
Also starring Jean Arthur (last seen in "The Talk of the Town"), Thomas Mitchell (last seen in "Gone With the Wind"), Rita Hayworth (last seen in "Cover Girl"), Richard Barthelmess, Sig Ruman, Allyn Joslyn, Noah Beery Jr.
RATING: 4 out of 10 condors
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