La baie du destin

This is the first true technicolor feature to be made in the UK. The story concerns a beautiful young Spanish gypsy woman (French actress Anna Bella) who flees to England where she falls in love with a Canadian horse trainer (Henry Fonda) against a back drop of the UK's premier horse race, The Derby.

The story is a bit unoriginal and the dialogue extremely clunky in places. There is also an element of tweeness to the depictions of gypsy life. Yet despite the so-so plot and (at times) wooden acting there is a certain charm in the film. The Technicolor photography is gorgeous and it provides a very rare colour record of what England & Ireland looked like prior to the second world war. The scenes on Epsom downs are also remarkably well filmed (considering the technical limitations of early technicolor filming on location) and the colour really brings an otherwise very average film to vivid life. There are one or two moments which would make the politically correct viewer squirm, such as the depiction of black & white minstrels.

If this film had been made in black & white i suspect it would have been long forgotten now, but as a curio it is a fascinating insight into another era. The photography is beautiful at times and make the film watchable. If only the same care had been taken with the script. Its a shame that this DVD only seems to be available in the U.S. though as i think it is calling out for a decent release.

In the late 19th century a Spanish gypsy princess (Annabella) falls in love and marries a nobleman (Leslie Banks) but he dies shortly after in a riding accident. She returns to Spain, but 40 years later descendents of the couple (Henry Fonda and Annabella in a dual role) meet and fall in love with their relationship also revolved around horses and horse racing.

This Irish set romancer is best known for being the first British three strip Technicolor feature film and one of only 9 made by Britain in the 1930s. It was also the film in which Hollywood star Henry Fonda met Frances Ford Seymour, the woman who would become his wife and the mother of Peter and Jane while they were filming on the set at Denham Studios where the film was in part shot. The film also benefits from a cameo by opera singer and tenor John McCormack, a cross dressing heroine and some good looking location work.

The story is pleasant, though artificial and inconsequential. The scene where the heroine was obliged to go swimming and thus reveal her true identity is almost identical to one in the earlier Girls Will Be Boys with Dolly Haas. The print I saw was from the Cohen Collection, looking superb, and what I really enjoyed was seeing Ireland and pre-war London and its people in colour, together with character actors like Mark Daly and D.J. Williams, previously confined to faded monochrome footage. And not least the legendary Irish tenor, John McCormack, whom I've long heard recordings of, but never seen. Annabella and Henry Fonda make an attractive leading couple.

Although there had been earlier British colour films in other processes, this was the first in technicolour.Obviously Fox spent the money on the cast and colour,as the story is second rate. Lots of lovely country views and John Mccornick singing away.Curiously he keeps on looking at a small book for the lyrics.A very experienced cast many who had been in films since early silent films.

Wings of the Morning is both the title of the film and the name of a gypsy horse who rides in the English Derby at Epsom Downs. It was the first modern technicolor film to be shot in the British Isles. To insure quality cinematographer Ray Rennahan who was THE color guy in Hollywood was brought over and he did a first rate job. I guess for good luck Henry Fonda who appeared in the first outdoor technicolor film in the USA came over to appear in this one. In the tradition of Americans appearing in British productions, Fonda plays a Canadian horse trainer with the Irish name of Kerry Gilfallen replete with his Nebraska twang.

In fact most of this British production is shot in Ireland and I hope that Wings of the Morning is available to folks in Ireland in any format. Their country is really nicely captured in some really lush greens. And there is some nice color footage of London and the Epsom Derby in the middle Thirties.

There are two stories, a brief prologue involving gypsy princess Annabella and the Irish Lord Clontarf played by Leslie Banks. They wed against all convention and soon after, Banks is killed in a riding accident. Of course most of the family snubs the widow and she returns to the gypsies.

Fast forward some forty years and Annabella is now playing her own great granddaughter and she's back in Ireland having fled Spain from the revolution going on there. She flees like Katharine Hepburn did in Sylvia Scarlett, in the guise of a boy and fools everybody including horse trainer Henry Fonda.

Of course the romance develops and a pair of horses get trained and primed for the Epsom Derby. Horse stories are no different in the UK then they are the USA and if you've seen enough of them on the silver screen you have an idea how the rest of the film goes.

Champion jockey Steve Donoghue makes an appearance in Wings of the Morning and lucky indeed we are to have a technicolor filmed appearance of the great John McCormack who favors us with four songs sung at a party scene at Clontarf castle. McCormack was an icon in many an Irish and Irish American household. A great concert singer, he and an Italian tenor named Caruso share equal credit in developing the record industry as they both signed with Edison's fledgling RCA Victor label back in the day. You couldn't find too many Italian households without a Caruso record back in the day nor many Irish households without a gramophone and McCormack records to play on them.

During his sequence McCormack sings and reads material, lyrics I'm sure he must have sang a gazillion times. My guess is that he was 53 when Wings of the Morning was made and may have been sustaining memory problems. McCormack died in 1945 and had not sung for several years at that point.

Wings of the Morning were it not for McCormack and technicolor would be a rather ordinary race track story. Still it's good entertainment and for folks in Ireland, a must.