Ceiling Zero

Mail pilot Dizzy Davis (James Cagney) is a daredevil and a womanizer like a textbook example. After he dropped a scheduled flight because of a rendezvous, his friend and colleague Texas Clarke (Stuart Erwin) stands in for him. Due to bad sight, the plane meets with an accident while landing, and Texas dies. Dizzy puts the blame on himself. To fix up that fatal error, he starts a bad weather kamikaze flight.

Hawks' preliminary study to "Only Angels Have Wings" is an absorbing aviator film which does not surprise very much though. A troup of airmen, intrepidly looking in death's eye, between the flight sequences, it's a drama of interiors. Duty and honor, lust and loyalty of professionals, a question of fast-paced flow of words and swifter movements. Hawks' (typical) flawed hero, played by the master of nimble gestures, James Cagney, is small and every handling an expression of his being. Although he flirts with June Travis and tries to impose his room keys on her, his love applies to his understanding chief and friend, the plagued Pat O'Brien.

Unfortunately, all this comes along as pretty conventional (particularly for a Hawks film), but is entertaining nonetheless with a great James Cagney in the lead.

CEILING ZERO (Warner Brothers, Cosmopolitan Production, 1935/36), produced and directed by Howard Hawks, is an aviation drama staged and written by Frank Wead, author of the 1935 stage play starring John Litel and Osgood Perkins. Rather than featuring both Litel and Perkins to reprise their initial roles, the studio provided the then popular friendly rival team and best friends collaboration of James Cagney and Pat O'Brien. Following their earlier successes of HERE COMES THE NAVY (1934), DEVIL DOGS OF THE AIR (1935) and THE IRISH IN US (1935), the main distinction CEILING ZERO doesn't have is the common support by Frank McHugh in a role here enacted by Stuart Erwin in a convincing serio-serious performance. Basically a filmed stage play with several exterior scenes revolving air flying and outside airport activity, CEILING ZERO ranks one of the finest of the Cagney and O'Brien collaborations, thanks to good scripting, acting and fine direction of Howard Hawks.

Before the story gets underway, the opening title first explains the meaning of "Ceiling Zero - that time when fog, rain or snow completely fills the flyable air between the sky or ceiling and the Earth. Until recent years, no pilot dared to fly in ceiling zero weather." Set at the Federal Airlines in Newark, New Jersey, plot development focuses on Jake L. Lee (Pat O'Brien), a hard-driving field boss who must do what he has to do, ranging from firing those for not properly doing their job, or to later hire "Dizzy" Davis (James Cagney, sporting a mustache), an ace pilot under the better judgment of Al Stone (Barton MacLane), the company supervisor, With Jake and Dizzy being best friends for many years, he risks his career for his association with Dizzy. Dizzy isn't very well liked by his fellow flyers, especially Lou (Isabel Jewell), wife of "Texas" Clarke (Stuart Erwin), and by Tay Lawson (Henry Wadsworth), for forcing himself on Tommy Thomas (June Travis), a girl pilot whom he loves. Problems arise when Dizzy feigns illness to have Texas fly in his place in order to keep his date with Mary (Martha Tibbetts), one of his former girlfriends, now married Jake's wife. After Texas loses his life flying blind in ceiling zero, and being told off by Lou, Dizzy also risks losing both Jake's friendship and flying license as well. Co-stars include Craig Reynolds (Joe Allen), Richard Purcell ("Smiley" Johnson), Robert Light (Les Brogan), Addison Richards and Mathilde Comont. Garry Owen, not a very well-known character actor having appeared in numerous movie productions, stands out as Mike Owens, a former ace pilot reduced to shining door knows after a crackup that has deformed his speaking and memory ability.

With Cagney heading that cast, the film very much belongs to Pat O'Brien, whose supporting role is actually the lead. Cagney doesn't appear until 19 minutes into the story. His arrogant character comes similar to the latter Cagney-O'Brien collaboration of THE FIGHTING 69th (Warners, 1940) with similar results. Though CEILING ZERO doesn't contain better marque female names in support like Margaret Lindsay or a Glenda Farrell, the performances provided by the lesser known June Travis and Margaret Tibbets are commendable, especially Isabel Jewell coming off stronger than the major lead performers during its crucial scenes.

Ranked as one of the best of the aviation melodramas of the 1930s next to Hawkes own ONLY ANGELS HAVE WINGS (Columbia, 1939), CEILING ZERO, which did have television broadcasts in the past, has become strictly limited. In the early days of cable television, CEILING ZERO played on Showtime (1987) and Turner Network Television (1989-1992) before its distribution to video cassette in 1993. To date, CEILING ZERO has yet to broadcast on Turner Classic Movies or distribution on DVD due to legal complications regarding this title and its remake, INTERNATIONAL SQUADRON (Warners, 1941) starring James Stephenson and Ronald Reagan. Maybe like the obscure NIGHT FLIGHT (MGM, 1933) with John and Lionel Barrymore, CEILING ZERO may be seen flying across the screen of TCM in the future. For now, one would have to rely on the out of print 1993 video tape to locate and view out of curiosity's sake. (***1/2)

This film stays mainly on the ground rather than in the air, probably because it was originally a stage play. The action focuses on the Newark, New Jersey branch of fictitious Federal Airlines and its employees, who are exclusively involved in delivering the mail.

Pat O'Brien plays Jake Lee, the fast talking hard-nosed operations manager of the Newark branch. The industry is one in transition as the WWI flying aces and barnstormers that once dominated as air mail pilots are being slowly replaced with "college men" - engineers. Enter James Cagney as Dizzy Davis who is one of those old aces - if you can possibly imagine the energetic James Cagney as somebody who's on the verge of being all washed up at anything in 1935. Jake, Dizzy's old WWI flying buddy, has gotten him a job at the Newark office as Dizzy is on the verge of losing his pilot's license as he has a bad ticker and a bad attitude when it comes to following all of the new rules that did not exist when he first started out in the business.

There are romantic complications too. Touchiest of these is the fact that Jake's wife of two years, Mary, was serious about Dizzy right before she met Jake. This is information Dizzy and Mary desperately want to keep from Jake in order to spare his feelings. There's also a new female pilot at the Newark branch, Tommy, all of 19, who catches Dizzy's eye. Tommy has a steady boyfriend, but she's fascinated by this older experienced WWI ace and his exciting stories and lifestyle.

Dizzy is a fellow on the move with him chasing Tommy and age and the odds chasing him, and then there's Mike, an old ace Dizzy's age who cracked up in a wreck. His bones healed but his mind didn't, and Dizzy is horrified to see his old mirror image turned simpleton and janitor. It's unspoken, but you just know that Dizzy sees his own possible future when he looks at the guy.

The film is a real edge-of-your-seat experience, even though almost all of the action is on the ground as pilots fly in "ceiling zero" weather, and some make it back alive and some don't. It's an exciting little movie with a look at the state of flight technology in 1935. Highly recommended.

Ceiling Zero is a story about airmail pilots back when flying was itself an occupational hazard. It was written by Frank W. Wead, better known as Spig Wead whose life was later brought to the screen by John Ford in Wings of Eagles.

For those who've seen Wings of Eagles, they know that Spig Wead was a navy pilot who set all kinds of aviation records before becoming paralyzed with a broken neck due to a fall down some stairs in his home. After that Wead turned to writing and published all kinds of articles, stories, and screenplays mostly relating to aviation.

Ceiling Zero was Wead's one attempt at a Broadway play. It ran for three months on Broadway in 1935 with John Litel and Osgood Perkins in the roles played by James Cagney and Pat O'Brien respectively. It got good critical acclaim, but a short Broadway run as did a lot of plays during the Depression.

O'Brien is the operations manager of an airline and Cagney is an old friend who is an irresponsible but talented flyer. Superficially those seem like parts tailor made for Cagney and O'Brien, but this is in fact a serious drama so their usual hijinks are not present in this film as well they shouldn't have been.

Cagney and O'Brien had done another film about aviation, Devil Dogs of the Air which is far more lighthearted, but which Warner Brothers invested far more production values. For the most part, Ceiling Zero is a photographed stage play with some scenes that are clearly done on the backlot.

I'm surprised that Wead who did in fact write more for the screen didn't push for a bigger budget and some location shooting for his play. On the plus side Director Howard Hawks handles his cast real well and you can see some influences for the later and better Only Angels Have Wings.

Howard Hawks is undoubtedly one of the great Hollywood directors, but unfortunately not even his track record is 100%. Ceiling Zero is not a bad film, it just isn't a good one either. Apart from a brilliant performance from Jimmy Cagney there is nothing much to remember: the script is a cliche, supporting cast are "hammy" and worst of all the set decoration is awful. The airport control room looks like something out of an Ed Wood movie. Watch this if you do not have anything better to do but do not invest any money!