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The first half of "Behind That Curtain" is a excellent example of the drawbacks of early talkies. Except for Warner Baxter, all the actors indulge in over-enunciation to the extent that they often sound as if English is not their first language. The camera is nailed down in one long interior scene after another with the occasional mike boom shadow crossing faces. The second half, however, is a strong improvement. The lead actress learns how to properly emote and there are a number of excellent exteriors in the desert and in downtown San Francisco of 1929. Also livening events in the last half are cameo appearances by Boris Karloff and the character Charlie Chan, both in their first talkie appearances. Chan is played for once by an actual Asian person and Karloff has a good scene where he has to pretend to be mute, giving a glimpse of his later masterful work as Frankenstein' monster. He is also given the horrible line, "the desert gives and the desert takes away" but imparts a wonderful sense of mystery to it.

"The Key" starts off promisingly with atmospheric photography as British troops track down a Sein Fein leader. Apparently Warner Bros thought this wasn't enough, so halfway through the film a love triangle is introduced between William Powell, Edna Best and Colin Clive. All it succeeds in doing is derailing the film into very familiar territory. Seeing Colin Clive making dead bodies with a gun rather than bringing them back to life in a lab sparks some interest but other than that he spends his time looking glum (did he ever smile?). William Powell begins the film with an accent and a "right-ho, pip, pip" clipped speech that vanishes by the third reel and he and Edna Best (in her first U.S. film) have absolutely no chemistry. Director Curtiz does well until the highpoint of the love story where he pulls the camera out the window into the fog and goes into a flashback that looks like it belongs on a 1890 stage. Add to this a criminally underused Donald Crisp and a hokey ending and you have one missed opportunity.

First, you have to buy Richard Dix as an upper-crust sculptor and pacifist named "Rocky." Then you have to accept that after one dogfight he turns into a cold-blooded killing machine. There's no middle road with this guy! The aerial combat scenes are well done with an excellent use of miniatures, but they aren't in the same league as the ones in "Wings," "Hell's Angels" or "The Dawn Patrol." The squadron banter has a realistic feel to it unlike any of the other dialogue in the film. There's a particularly bad scene where the heroine is a warfront nurse and the wounded Private Exposition is brought in to fill her in on the story so far. Dix's rapid changes in personality are given no real reason and make hash of his character and anything profound the film is trying to say. Obviously modeled after "Journey's End" and all the other anti-war plays of the time, "Ace Of Aces" ends up making a travesty of both pacifism and soldiering.