Hell's Angels

Aroview: Still highly watchable, this early sound feature financed and 'directed' by the notorious Howard Hughes, boosts its melodramatic story of WWI heroics and romance with breathtaking, and unsurpassed scenes of aerial combat.

Hall and Lyon play brothers who enlist in the British Airforce and find themselves pursing German zeppelins above England and running bombing missions in France, with contrasting degrees of bravery and cowardice. Harlow (in her only filmed-in-colour role) stars as the love-interest with unrepentedly 'loose' morals who keeps this a secret from idealistic lover Hall.

Above all this thrills with the ultra-realistic, climactic dogfight scene in which cameras were bolted to the sides of a squadron of bi-planes, which scream across the cloudscape, machine-guns roaring.

Note: Being made on the cusp of sound-films, Hughes astonishingly completely reshot his first silent version. Apparently much of the film was scripted and directed by FRANKENSTEIN's James Whale.

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