Soaring Stars

This MGM short is about the stars who like to fly. In fact, the sizable income of even faded stars was sufficient to let them buy air planes and pilot them themselves. It's an excuse to show well known personalities in their civilian lives.

It's written by Marion Mack, now best remembered for playing Buster Keaton's love interest in THE GENERAL. She scripted four shorts in total, one of which, STREAMLINED SWING, was directed by Keaton.

Flying stars have taken over the Santa Anita racetrack with an air show. Two young ladies are looking for stars but they forgot their autograph books. One of them gets an unusual idea and they get involved with famous actress Ruth Hussey's missing bracelet.

This is a bit of star watching and air show watching. I don't know the flying people. I recognize quite a few of the Hollywood stars. The flying is fun. The fake flying is also fun. The celebrity air show crowd seems very real. I don't know the event behind this short. They probably set something up with the balloon and then cobbled together a story afterwards.

Soaring Stars (1943)

** 1/2 (out of 4)

Cheap "show off our stars" short from Warner has a pair of autograph hunters (Sally Payne, Mary Treen) at a race track where various Hollywood stars are watching an aviation contest. The two are there to get some signatures but accidentally find themselves caught up in a bracelet that was stolen from Ruth Hussey. There's really not too much "story" going on here as the main reason to see the film is due to the stars that make brief (sometimes just seconds) cameos. Edmund Lowe, Irene Hervey, Bonita Granville, Jackie Cooper, Joe E. Brown, John Carroll, Freddie Bartholomew and Richard Arlen are among the famous faces showing up. If you're a fan of any of these you might want to give this a spin but I doubt others will get too much entertainment out of this thing.