Ángeles infernales

Having just watched my VHS of this and wondering if it was out on DVD yet, I came to the IMDB to check and saw a comment about how hackneyed and awful this movie was, with the worst traits of the silent movies...lol! For those who don't know, this WAS a silent movie, and Hughes took so long trying to perfect the aerial sequences that sound came along, so then he had to try to rework everything else into sound, delaying things even further. Hughes was a "bit" of a perfectionist, ala Chaplin with "City Lights" and for every wonderful thing that does, it creates dozens of others you have to deal with as well... My favorite story of the making of this movie (recalling across 30 years from a book by Donald Dwiggins called "The Stunt Pilots" involved Paul Mantz (one of the lead pilots, later to die making "Flight of the Phoenix" after being the king of the Hollywood pilots for over 30 years) and Jean Harlow waiting in an airport restaurant for Hughes to fly in from somewhere and Mantz placing a nickel Coca-Cola bottle under a table leg before Hughes arrived and telling Harlow to "watch this". Hughes arrives for the meeting and being the perfectionist but also a bit ?, he never says anything about the table, never looks under it, but spends the whole lunch trying to eat with one hand and hold the table level with the other....

Hughes as director had his limitations, but he was at his best in making possible the great combat and special effects scenes. The Zeppelin scenes are so realistic it is difficult to believe it was all model and special set work. In 1927-1930 there just wasn't available a "junk" Zeppelin for Hughes to buy and shoot down. It would not surprise me to learn that he offered the U.S.Navy or the Zeppelin Co. a good round sum to buy "Los Angeles" (LZ-126) or "Graf Zeppelin" (LZ-127) for that purpose! Hughes' inexperience as a director shows up at its worst in his handling of the cast. Even allowing for the difficulties of "Dawn of Sound" filming, and that HELL'S ANGELS started as a silent, Hughes tolerated some of the worst acting ever seen in a major film. There is some good work, though. Jean Harlow is very smooth and natural, and the actors playing the German officers are satisfactorily sly and evil.

The story? Oh, two brothers are in love with the same girl, who doesn't really give a hoot for either of them. They volunteer for a suicide mission in a captured German bomber, and .... But, see the ending for yourself. Meanwhile, the Germans are trying to bomb London with their Zeppelin, but the Royal Flying Corps in on the job. That's about it.

For true airship buffs, I'll add a word about the designation "L-32" visible in one scene when the "Zeppelin" is over London. In the minds of folks not too knowledgeable about Zeppelin history, there is apt to be confusion about the "L" and "LZ" designations of German airships used in The Great War (WW1) and after. The German Naval Air Service gave their ships an "L" number. The Zeppelin Co. gave its products an "LZ" number, and the two did not correspond. There was a real "L-32" (LZ-74), and a real "L-7" (LZ-32). Both were destroyed during raids over London in 1916. Perhaps Hughes may have had either of these airships in mind for his fictional one. Incidentally, there is no record of the "observation gondola", which figures in the film story, ever having been used over England. It was used to some extent in raids over European cities.

I saw this film (movie) in about 1933 and still remember every scene. Without the use of bad language it conveyed the fear,excitement,and gallantry of the time. The German evil was perhaps overplayed,but it was made just a very few years after the War. The flying scenes were dramatic and at least as effective as any made in recent years.

Is it possible to obtain a copy?if so where.

Brothers Roy (James Hall) and Monte Rutledge (Ben Lyon) enlist in the Royal Flying Corp and end up flying dangerous missions over England and France in the early days of aerial combat. Howard Hugh's film is best remembered for its extensive aerial footage, involving dozens of aircraft including period-correct Royal Aircraft Factory S. E.5s, Fokker D. VIIs, and a 1920s Sikorsky S-29-A mocked up to look like a German Gotha bomber. The flying scenes (real and in miniature) are outstanding with the attack on the Zeppelin over London and the crash of a large bomber standouts. The epic production, during which several planes were destroyed and three pilots/crew lost their lives, was said to be the most expensive ever (although this may have been marketing hyperbole), partly because it was caught in the silent-to-talkie transition period and needed to be extensively reshot before release. The simplistic 'human story-line' about the brothers, one heroic, one cowardly, is much less memorable with a lot of stilted dialogue, artificial-sounding bonhomie, and trite romantic melodrama (involving up-right Roy's pining after Helen (Jean Harlow), a peroxide blond vamp of dubious morals who seems more interested in variety than sobriety). The pre-code film contains some expletives (shocking then, tame now), Harlow wears some clingy and revealing dresses at times, and the scene in which a character is shot in the back is extremely real looking ( for an era when most 'shot people' simply put a hand on their chest and fell over wearing a shocked expression). A must see for fans of both vintage films and of vintage aircraft.

This is a fabulous film, far ahead of its time. The screenplay is outstanding, and all the actors did a marvelous job, and the ones who played Germans as well. There was only one German in a minor role and one Finnish actor, who played a German, all the others were Americans, to my big surprise! I am an Austrian and German is my mother tongue and I would have bet that there were at least half a dozen Germans in this movie! I was also mesmerized by the details of the air battles, which were mostly shot in the air. Jean Harlow was beautiful and gave a persuading performance, not to mention her great looks! I rented this movie, because I heard about it the first time, when I watched "The Aviator" and I have to say that this picture is one of the most entertaining and exciting movies I have seen in a long time and it should be an example how movies should be made as a guideline for modern day Hollywood! It is a perfect example that a great story, action and special effects can live together in a beautiful piece of art without sacrificing anything!