War and love, this Hollywood routine that has been tried and tested, originally existed nearly a hundred years ago. Love is a four-cornered love, which is even more advanced than "Pearl Harbor"; the nearly one-hour war scene can be regarded as a classic in any era. The director and screenwriter’s pilot background makes it easy for them to control this flight-themed film. The opening credits also dedicate the film to those flying pioneers. The strong support of the military ensured that the second half of the film reproduced the battle of Saint-Mihiel in the Meuse in northern France at the end of the First World War. There were everything from aircraft, artillery, machine guns, tanks, and hot air balloons. A pilot even collided during the shooting. Die. In the era when there were no computer special effects and only the yellow color was inserted in the later stage to indicate the flames, such a big production was especially commendable. The first Oscar for the best visual effects award (called the best engineering effect award at the time) deserves its name.
As an epic film, this film covers many elements. You can criticize that his anti-war thinking is not as profound as in "No War on the Western Front" two years later. You can criticize that the glory of the final heroism is still greater than the sorrow of losing the beloved son. Feeling sympathy with brotherhood to accidental injury to dying kiss" Some blood, you can complain about the procrastination of the Paris carnival bubble fight in the middle, but all the regrets and shortcomings will no longer exist after you consider the age of the film. Those young enthusiasm, those worried, those daring (or so passionate? The last kiss between the two male protagonists is said to be the first scene of a man kissing on the big screen), all those relaxed and humorous, all took advantage of Charles Lindberg's single The heat of the feat of flying across the Atlantic without landing has kept the film from being released for 63 consecutive weeks.
Actress Clara Bow is a superstar in the silent film era of Hollywood and a well-known sex symbol in the so-called "Roaring Twenties" of the last century. As the chief actress of Paramount at the time, the company also specially modified the script for her, tailored military uniforms to give her more room for play, and even (deliberately) a little dew point. However, like many other silent film stars, Clara Bow doesn't like sound films and is not good at it. So soon after her marriage in 1931, she retired and lived in seclusion on her husband's farm since the age of 28, out of public sight. More than eighty years later, at the 84th Oscar, another silent film "The Artist" won the best picture. The heroine in the film was based on Clara Bow.
Gary Cooper, who just debuted, played a small supporting role in this film, that is, the student who crashed before going on the battlefield. Compared with being familiar with a face, his bigger gain is that he had a brief chance to associate with Clara Bow, and with the help of the latter gradually embarked on the road of superstars, including two Oscar winners. It’s also worth mentioning that in Gary Cooper’s short two-minute appearance, he ate half of Hershey’s chocolate; the film has a close-up on the packaging—this is one of the earliest known product placements. .
The two male protagonists, Richard Arlen who played David and Charles Rogers (nicknamed Buddy) who played Jack, are relatively less famous. However, the former worked as a pilot in World War I, and the latter received flight training before shooting, so both of them went to heaven to complete the shooting in person, which is probably rare in film history. Gossip, although in the film David and Sylvia are separated from life and death, the two actors in reality got married and have a son.
Although this film is one of the few Oscars for Best Picture, but the director is not nominated, this is also due to the fact that there were only three nominations for each award that year. In fact, this type of subject matter is the director William Wellman's masterpiece, which of course has something to do with his personal experience as a pilot. As an actor, he also played a cameo role in this film, and made his wife and children show up (playing the peasant woman and daughter in the last village). I don't know if this is for cost saving or an unspoken rule.
In fact, at the first Oscar, another film won the Best Picture, Unique and Artistic Production award, which was considered to be at the same level as the best picture (called Outstanding Picture at the time). However, the award was cancelled the following year, and only the orthodox status of "Wing" was later recognized.
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