Stubs - Beggars of Life

Beggars of Life (1928) Starring Wallace Beery, Richard Arlen, Louise Brooks. Directed by William A. Wellman. Screenplay by Benjamin Glazer with Titles by Julian Johnson. Based on the novel Beggars of Life by Jim Tully (New York, 1924). Produced by Benjamin Glazer Run Time: 80 minutes USA Black and White. Silent. Drama.

In the fall of 1925, Outside Looking In was a minor hit on Broadway. Based on the biography of Jim Tully, who had spent seven years riding the rails of the US as a Hobo (what they used to call wandering homeless men), the play, written by Maxwell Anderson, ran for a total of 113 performances during the fall. One of the fans of the play was Charles Chaplin, who was in New York for the premiere of his film The Gold Rush (1925). He saw the play three times during its run. While he was in town, he also had a short love affair with a young dancer featured in the Ziegfeld Follies on Broadway. The third time he attended the play, he brought his young lover with him. She was not nearly as impressed as he was with the play. She would later comment she would have paid more attention to the play if she knew someday she would star in the film version. That young woman was Louise Brooks.

Perhaps known now for her later films in Europe: Pandora's Box (1929); Diary of a Lost Girl (1929) and Prix de Beauté (1930), in 1928, Brooks was a contract player at Paramount Pictures, having also been discovered by producer Walter Wanger while dancing in the Ziegfeld show. Wagner, who was also at Paramount, had actually encouraged Brooks to sign with MGM, the other studio interested in her, but she, as she often did, did it her way and signed with Paramount for a five-year contract in 1925. Never really sold on a film career, Brooks never took Hollywood fame or acting very seriously, though she did appear in a dozen films before Beggars of Life, working with directors like Frank Tuttle, Malcolm St. Clair and Howard Hawks and with such actors as W.C. Fields, Ford Sterling, Adolphe Menjou, and Wallace Beery before making Beggars of Life.

Wallace Beery, whom we’ve discussed before in our review of Min and Bill (1930), was already a big star in Hollywood. He had broken in playing comedy, even in a series of cross-dressing films as Sweedie, a Swedish maid character. He had turned to villains in such films as Patria (1917), in which he portrayed the still active Pancho Villa. Beery had appeared in a wide range of films prior to Beggars of Life, including The Last of the Mohicans (1920); The Round-Up (1920) with Fatty Arbuckle); Robin Hood (1922) with Douglas Fairbanks playing King Richard the Lionheart; reprising the role in the sequel Richard the Lion-Hearted (1923); The Lost World (1925), as Professor Challenger; Old Ironsides (1926); Casey at the Bat (1927); and Now We're in the Air (1927) opposite a still new talent, Louise Brooks.

Richard Arlen got into films in a rather unusual way. After World War I, Arlen worked in the oilfields of Oklahoma and Texas before heading to Hollywood to become a movie star. However, he found that no producer was interested. He took a job as a delivery boy for a film laboratory when the motorcycle which he was riding landed him with a broken leg outside the Paramount Pictures lot.  A director took pity on Arlen and gave him his start as an extra. His first screen appearance was in Ladies Must Live (1921). Arlen would appear in several films, but mostly in uncredited roles or in supporting roles. Wings was his breakout role.

At about the same time as Chaplin was discovering Outside Looking In, Paramount was also interested in the property, thinking Beggars of Life would make a good film. That job fell to William A. Wellman, their contracted director, who had recently finished their biggest hit from 1927, Wings.  Tully was originally going to adapt his own book, but in the end, the credit went to Benjamin Glazer. Glazer at the time was a very successful screenwriter, having won an Academy Award in 1927 for Best Writing (Adapted Screenplay) for his adaptation of the novel Seventh Heaven by Austin Strong.

While Tully’s book would have been considered an autobiography, the film is anything but. There is no Tully character and the story isn’t really based on his adventures on the rails. It was rumored at the time that Tully would appear in the film, that didn’t happen either.

Jim Tully didn't appear in the film, but he did visit the set. Seen here
with Louise Brooks, Wallace Beery and Richard Arlen.

Production began in May 1928, either on the 19^th (according to Exhibitors Herald and Moving Picture World) or the 24^th (according to Film Daily). There were 10 days of work done at the studio before the production team, seventy-five strong, left for location shooting at Jacumba Hot Springs California, down near the Mexican border, on June 3^rd. They would stay on location until June 27^th, when the crew returned to Hollywood.

The main reason for shooting in Jacumba was the use of the railroad as the train plays a large part in the telling of the story. All of that activity occurred in and around Locomotive 102. Since there were few trains scheduled to use the track, it allowed for Wellman and crew plenty of time to get shots without having to worry about being disturbed.

Location shooting had its ups and downs, especially for Brooks. She found that Arlen, despite his smiling demeanor, did not think much of her or her acting, letting it all go one night over whiskey when the two were alone. Not only did he not like the fact that he made far less than she did, but he thought she was a non-talent actress as well. According to Brooks, in her essay “On Location with Billy Wellman” written many years after the fact, Arlen, already drunk, told her “… You – why, you can’t even act! You’re not even good-looking. You’re a lousy actress and your eyes are too close together.”

Brooks seemed to have given her all to the production, letting herself get talked, by the director, into doing her own stunt on occasion. One time, while trying to run and hop on a moving train, she was nearly swept up underneath it.

The production crew on location at Jacumba.

While she worked hard, she also played hard. After watching her male stunt double, Harvey Parry, complete an arduous stunt and admiring his physique, she offered to let him come to her room that night, which he did. Brooks was known as a sexually liberated woman, long before it was considered fashionable. Her reputation followed after her. The next morning, Harvey confronted her. He had heard from someone that Brooks was the girlfriend of a studio executive whom she didn’t know. Harvey had heard that this executive had syphilis, so in front of the whole crew, Harvey asked Louise if she had syphilis, much to her great embarrassment.

But these distractions didn’t really affect the actual production of the film. What did impact it was the transition from silent to sound films. As theaters across the country were transitioning, Paramount Pictures wanted to have a sound product, so the film was released in both versions. Using the Movietone process, the sound effects, a synchronized musical score, a bit of dialogue and a song were included. Beggars of Life would be the studio’s first release to include spoken dialogue. No sound elements from the original release still exist.

The song was sung by Wallace Beery, who, ironically, would later be fired by Paramount most likely because of the same vocal qualities that would make him a memorable actor at this next studio, MGM; his basso voice and gruff, deliberate drawl.

The film opens with a hobo, Jim (Richard Arlen), walking up to a farmhouse. The door is open, but the screen door is closed. Jim can see and smell the food on the table in front of a farmer (Frank Brownlee), who appears to be sleeping. Jim tries to rouse the man, and when that fails takes the bold step of going inside. He finds that the man is not asleep, but dead with blood on the floor.

The only person inside is Nancy (Louise Brooks), who is dressed in men’s clothing. She admits that the man is her adoptive father and that ever since she’s lived with him, the man had been making sexual overtones towards her. Finally, this morning, after she made him breakfast, the man grabbed her. In her struggle to escape, she ended up shooting him with a rifle. Mortally wounded, the man ended up sitting down at his place at the table.

Nancy (Louise Brooks) tells Jim the story of the murder.

Nancy wants to get out before the murder is discovered. She feels her odds are better if she looks like a boy rather than a girl.

Jim is reluctant to help her but agrees to help her escape. He is used to riding the rails and agrees to get her on a train going in one direction, while he gets on one going in the opposite. He makes a point of packing the food from the dead man’s plate before the two leave the house.

Jim (Richard Arlen) tries to teach Nancy how to jump on a moving boxcar.

Nancy claims to have caught a train before, but her first attempt goes badly and she gets thrown. Jim takes pity on her and agrees to have her come with him. With his help, the two manage to scramble into an open flatbed and are about to indulge in a little picnic when a train detective catches them. He makes the two of them jump off the train. Nancy is a little worse for wear, but manages to walk off her injury.

Nancy ends up in the weeds next to the track.

The two walk until it gets to be nightfall. Jim leads her into a farmer’s pasture, where he cleans out enough room for them to sleep. While Nancy is a bit nervous about sleeping next to a strange man, the two talk about their dreams. Jim is on his way to Canada where his Uncle will set him up if he wants to settle down. That sounds good to Nancy, who has similar dreams as well. The two sleep next to each other without incident until the next morning. That’s when a Farmer discovers the two. They run off before he can stop them.

A publicity still showing the moment they're discovered in the farmer's hay.

But by the next morning, there are already wanted posters out for Nancy, which Jim tries to hide from Nancy. They’re both hungry and when a horse-drawn bakery cart goes by, they hop on the back and help themselves to buns to eat. The driver (Guinn “Big Boy” Williams) who had been asleep, awakes when he hears them. Moving a lever, the seat they’re on withdraws and Jim and Nancy fall onto the street.

For a few moments, things are looking up as they grab and eat breakfast on a bakery cart.

Jim leads Nancy off the main road and into the jungle, eventually ending up at a hobo camp run by The Arkansaw Snake (Robert Perry) where they are not allowed to eat any of the stew that is being prepared since they didn’t contribute to the pot.

Oklahoma Red (Wallace Berry) show up carrying a stolen keg of moonshine.

After a while, Oklahoma Red (Wallace Beery) shows up, carrying a stolen keg over his shoulder and singing a song about being a hobo. Arkansaw relents control to Oklahoma and he offers up his moonlighting to everyone including Jim and Nancy, whom everyone still thinks is a boy. It is only after her backside is noticed that her true identity is revealed.

The hobos take a prurient interest in her and Jim is no position to physically stop them. However, he shows them her wanted poster and the men back away. They don’t have any plans to let her come with them, but Red insists they bring her along.

Officials raid the camp, but the hobos fight back, subduing their cops. When the train they plan to ride comes by, the hobos run off with Red even going back to collect the keg. All of the men make it into the same boxcar. They all have colorful names, like Lame Hoppy (Roscoe Karns), a one-legged hobo; Black Mose (Edgar “Blue” Washington), a black hobo who is accompanying a sick white hobo; Skinny (Horace “Kewpie” Morgan); Baldy (George Kotsonaros); Ukie (Jack Chapin); Rubin (Johnnie Morris); and Skelly (Andy Clark).

Red sees Jim as an obstacle to get to Nancy and plans to get rid of him.

Red takes control of the situation, stating that if he’s in a gang, it’s his gang. Giving Nancy the once over, he adds that any girl in the gang is his girl. There is a very real sense that rape and/or gang rape is not too far away from happening. Jim seems to be all that is standing in the way, so Red organizes a Kangaroo court to find Jim guilty and sentence him to death by being thrown from the train. Dressing up like judge and jury, Red finds Jim guilty before any evidence is given.

With Red's gun, Jim manages to hold everybody back away from Nancy.

But Nancy insists on choosing Arkansaw as her champion and a fight ensues amongst the hobos. Jim manages to pick up Red’s gun when it falls to the floor. But their confrontation is interrupted when more railroad detectives aboard the train start making their way back to the boxcar. Red climbs out and detaches the car from the rest of the train, sending several cars, including the caboose, back down the perilous track and crashing into a barricade at the bottom of the hill.

Black Mose (Edgar “Blue” Washington) takes Nancy and Jim to an abandoned shack.

With the authorities coming, the hobos scatter. Black Mose, who is carrying his sick companion, leads Jim and Nancy to a nearby abandoned shack where they can hide out. After a while, Black Mose goes off to look for food for his friend and while he is gone, the hobo dies. Jim and Nancy cover him up to his eyes.

Red shows up in a stolen car with a stolen dress for Nancy.

Out of the blue, Oklahoma Red shows up driving a car he's managed to pilfer and a dress for Nancy, which she puts on while Jim and Red step outside to talk. Jim keeps the gun on Red but allows him to make one final play for Nancy, using the tact that they’re looking for the two of them and splitting up would be in everyone’s best interest. While what he says makes some sense, Nancy and Jim decide to stay together. Red starts to leave, but comes back one more time and manages to take the gun away from Jim.

Jim continues to train his gun on Red even after he's tried to help them out.

Red claims to be tired and, with time to kill before the next train, lays down next to the dead hobo to take a nap.

Black Mose returns with food, including a chicken, which he proceeds to pluck, not realizing his friend is already dead. With Red pretending to be asleep, Jim and Nancy make a run for it, steal the car and drive off. Red stops pretending to sleep and tells Black Mose that he was waiting for them to make a run, hoping to help them since they’re in love.

When Black Mose discovers his friend is dead, it hatches a plan with Red. To better aide in Nancy’s escape, they dress the dead man in her man clothes and then take him back to the wreckage. There they place his body in amongst the lumber cargo along with igniter fuel to create a fire. Black Mose warns Red about getting trapped, but Red tells him his foot hasn’t slipped yet.

Authorities arrive and arrest Black Mose and reattach the caboose and other cars to the main train. After they’re going, Red sets a fire. The authorities are trapped in the caboose with the fire in the car next to them. Red manages to escape from the car and once again uncouples the cars from the main train. But this time he’s shot by authorities as he climbs on top of the boxcar.

The caboose and flatcar head back down the track and eventually off the track into the gorge below.

Cut to Jim and Nancy on a train headed to Canada, thinking about how Red helped them escape.

Meanwhile, Red, who is only semi-conscious, slips off the boxcar and over the edge of the cliff. He lands hard on a landing and with his last breath says, “I guess my foot slipped”.

The film had its premiere in Indianapolis on September 5, 1928, and its New York opening on September 22. Seeing as it was Wellman’s next film after Wings, as well as Paramount’s first film with synchronized dialogue, there was a lot of anticipation around its release. However, the film did not fare well with film audiences or critics, receiving mixed reviews at best. As an example, Variety in its review on September 26^th review called it “not an exceptionally good picture.” Mordaunt Hall, in his review in the New York Times, dated September 24, states, “It is a picture that might have been infinitely better handled, for William Wellman, who is responsible for the direction, reveals but little intimate knowledge of his subject.”

Some of the thought about the film’s lack of success has to do with its dark tones during what was still the good times in the U.S.; the great depression was still over a year away and this wasn’t the right film at the right time. Audiences at the time were said to want their stars to look glamorous on film, rather than dressed like hobos.

There are some interesting features about the film. One that comes to mind is how Nancy tells Jim about the farmer attacking her. In what would normally now be a flashback with voice-over is told by showing the action with Nancy’s face superimposed over it, linking the teller with the story.

While Wallace Beery might not be my favorite actor, he certainly does have a star’s presence when he appears on the screen. You can’t help but look at him and I found him easier to take without sound. His character Red is hard to pin down. At one point, it is pretty obvious that he wants to rape Nancy, but only a few hours later, he lets the love he sees between Nancy and Jim change his mind to help them. He’s just a really bad guy with a heart o’ gold.

Louise Brooks, who is as good in this film as Richard Arlen is, never really looks like a boy. She is far too pretty to pass. Also, while she looks good in her signature bob haircut, I wonder if the farmer’s daughter that she’s supposed to portray would have that same exact style. I’m only guessing that Paramount didn’t want to deglamorize one of its buddy stars too much and wanted her to be recognizable on screen.

Arlen’s character is also hard to pin down. He at first takes pity on Nancy and then falls in love with her, but I get the feeling he’s somewhat subdued in defending her. He doesn’t really try to stand up to Arkansaw or Red to defend her and doesn’t try to take charge until he has a gun in his hand. But even then, you know that Red will turn the tables on him, which he does.

I don’t know enough about hobo life to comment on the film’s authenticity in that regard, but I do question one of the main points, the murder. The farmer was, after all, trying to rape his adoptive daughter, which one has to imagine was against the law even in the most rural of areas. The murder was therefore in self-defense. Now maybe you can tell me things were different back then, but I always wince when the plot is forwarded by dumb decisions.

William A. Wellman directing from on top of the train.

Despite the film’s shortcomings and lack of praise, Wellman considered it to be one of his favorites and his best silent film. In 1965, when the San Francisco International Film Festival was going to do a career retrospective on Wellman, he wanted them to show this film and had plans to bring Louise Brooks to the event. However, they couldn’t find a print of the film and Wings was shown instead.

While considered by some to be a hidden treasure, I was not as enamored with the film as I had hoped. However, there are so few films that survive from this era and so few films that star Louise Brooks survive (of her nearly two dozen films, six are lost or all but lost) that each one is therefore special. If you’re a fan of hers, of silent films or of the work of William A. Wellman, then you should see Beggars of Life.

For other Silent films, please see our Silent Film Review Hub.

Review Hub - Silent Cinema

With our November salute to Silent films, we thought it would be a good time to create a Review Hub to showcase all the silent films we've reviewed thus far on Trophy Unlocked. 

The era of silent films (1894-1929) is one rich with some of the greatest films ever produced. While we, at Trophy Unlocked tend towards the comedies and the work of Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton and Harold Lloyd, some great dramatic works were also made during this time, including Sunrise and Wings. This is an era of birth, in which cinema was learning to tell stories and ideas were passed through pantomime and title cards. And while the era of silent films came to an end in 1929, with the release of The Jazz Singer, silent films were still made beyond that time, most notably by Chaplin, who continued making silent films well into the 30's. The fairly recent French film, The Artist (2011) demonstrates that you don't always need words to entertain.  

Just like there are many great black and white Academy ratio films made before you were born, there are also some really great silent films which we encourage you to seek out as well. Here are the ones we've reviewed so far and we'll keep adding to the list as time goes by:

City Lights

Sherlock, Jr.  

Sunrise

The Artist (2011)

Wings (1927)

Nosferatu (1922) 

Safety Last (1923)

Modern Times (1936)

The Phantom of the Opera (1925)

The Squaw Man (1914)

Kid Auto Races at Venice (1914)

Show People (1928)

Tillie's Punctured Romance

Steamboat Bill, Jr. 

Shoulder Arms (1918)

The Birth of a Nation (1915)

London After Midnight

The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari

A Submarine Pirate

Fatty and Mabel Adrift (1916)

The Immigrant (1917)

One Week

The Cameraman

Intolerance (1916)

The Adventurer 

Beggars of Life

A Dog's Life

Seven Chances (1925)

The Balloonatic (1923)

Stubs - Wings

WINGS (1927) Starring: Clara Bow, Charles “Buddy” Rogers, Richard Arlen and Gary Cooper. Directed by William A. Wellman. Written by Hope Loring, Louis D. Lighton. Story by John Monk Saunders. Produced by Lucien Hubbard, Adolph Zukor, Jesse L. Lasky, B.P. Schulberg, Otto Kahn. Music by J.S. Zamecnik. Run Time: 144 minutes. Color Tinted. U.S.A. Silent, Action, Adventure, War, Romantic, Drama.

Wings was the first film to win the Academy Award (1927/1928) for Best Picture (called Best Picture, Production). But despite this claim, overtime, it seems to have fallen out of favor and almost seems to have been forgotten all together. WINGS is sometimes unfavorably compared with the other “best picture” from that first Oscar ceremony, SUNRISE (Most Artistic Quality of Production), and for a time it was even considered lost. But a print was found in the Cinémathèque Française film archive in Paris and quickly copied to safety film. This year, a restored WINGS, derived from that print, will finally get a DVD and Blu-Ray release, as part of Paramount Studio’s 100th Anniversary celebration.

As part of that release, it was shown recently in the Paramount Theater. Since it is a rare opportunity to see this film as it was meant to be seen, I wanted very much to take advantage of the opportunity. I have already gone on record for my love of SUNRISE, and I wanted this review to be about WINGS itself.

My first impression after seeing this film is that it is a great movie, not only for 1927/28 but for now. The old adage that they don’t make them like they used to is appropriate when describing this film. The aerial photography is incredible since it is so realistic. The actors were actually up in the airplanes, in some cases actually flying them, for all the dogfighting scenes. There were no such things as rear projection, blue screens, green screens or CGI. Arguably, some of the shots of flying, especially the close-ups, could have been shot on the ground, but they weren’t. When you see Buddy Rogers flying and another plane passes through the view, that is really another plane flying by. Even the crash landings, though staged, were really crashes.

Coming less than a decade after the end of World War I, WINGS may have been made as a reaction to MGM’s successful THE BIG PARADE (1925), one of the first Hollywood features made about that war. Things haven’t really changed much in Hollywood, and when one studio hits with a particular genre or subject matter, you can be sure there will be copycats or similar types of movies made. Separating it from THE BIG PARADE is the fact that WINGS is essentially a film about flyboys. And it was made at a time when America was fascinated by flying. Remember, Charles Lindberg had just crossed the Atlantic in 1927, making himself and flying big news.

Add to the mix, the IT girl, Clara Bow, who brought with her star power based on her cute and sexy public persona. She was Paramount’s biggest star and was at the height of her popularity. Earlier in the year, she had made the film she is most identified with, IT. Sadly, her career, like so many others would collapse with the coming of sound and even though THE JAZZ SINGER was already out, the transition to sound was still in the future when WINGS was made and released.

In the film, Clara plays Mary, a small town girl with a crush on the boy next door, Jack (Charles Rogers). They have a friendship, more than a romance. We see her help him put together a jalopy, which she christens the Shooting Star. But Jack’s heart belongs to Sylvia (Jobyna Ralston), a city girl visiting the small town. As soon as the car is ready to drive, Jack leaves Mary and drives over to Sylvia’s so she can have the first ride. However, Sylvia’s in love with David (Richard Arlen), the son from the richest family in town. David returns Sylvia’s affections. Jack, for his part, is oblivious to Sylvia’s love for David, but he has disdain for his rival just the same.

Jack, we’re told, has always dreamed of flying and when the U.S. finally enters the war, he signs up to be a pilot in the Army’s Air Corp. Much to his chagrin, he finds himself signing up next to David. When he’s going off to war, Jack goes to Sylvia to ask for some sort of memento to take with him into battle. He finds one that she has already made for David, her photo in a locket with a personal note on the back of the photo. David walks in while Jack and Sylvia embrace. She later tells David that she couldn’t tell Jack the truth after seeing the way he looked at her. The two agree not to burst Jack’s bubble.

David, we’re led to believe has lived a sheltered life and while he loves his parents and they love him, it’s not the touchy feely kind of relationship. He feels more comfortable saying goodbye to the family dog and to the butler. Like Jack, he has a good luck charm, but rather than a photo, it is a tiny teddy bear that he used to play with as a child. We’re talking small, fit in your pocket-sized bear.

Just as Jack is leaving, Mary calls him over, hoping for a last chance for him to see she is the one for him. She gives him a photo of her, which is about as cute as they get, but she gets a handshake instead of a kiss.

Jack and David find themselves together throughout training and their eventual deployment. It is while training that Jack and David finally get into it. Jack lets his hatred for David bubble over and the two get into a fistfight. The fact that David won’t go down easily changes Jack’s mind and the two become best friends. On their deployment to Germany, they bunk for mere minutes with Cadet White (Gary Cooper).

I say mere minutes, because while they’re still unpacking, the tall and lanky White goes off to practice figure eights before eating and does not return. This brief appearance has been said to have launched Cooper’s career.

Meanwhile, back in small town U.S.A., Mary reads an ad for ambulance drivers for a volunteer women’s corp. Sylvia, apparently just waits.

Jack and David become heroes, shooting down German planes and winning citations. One of which gets them a pass to Paris on the eve of the Big Push by the Allies. Mary, who happens to be in Paris as well, hears about the recall of the troops and goes to find Jack. It is at the famous Les Folies Bergère, where Jack is not only intoxicated but smitten with another girl. Taking the advice of the washroom attendant, Mary changes into one of the dancer’s costumes in an effort to win Jack away from the woman in the bar. She only succeeds when she bubbles more than the other woman when drunken Jack shakes her. (Jack is having hallucinations and bubbles are his pink elephants.)

Mary takes Jack to a hotel room. The assumption here is that she’s trying to get him a chance to dry out before returning to the battlefield, not to seduce him. Even if that had been her purpose, Jack is too drunk to do anything but pass out. While Jack is out, Mary decides to change back into her ambulance driver’s uniform. At the same time, MPs who are tasked with rounding up pilots burst into the room and see Mary half-naked with a drunken flyboy on the bed. This situation, though innocent as it may be, in the morals of the day, is enough to get Mary kicked out of the Woman’s Corp.

It is back on the battlefield, and minutes away from going into battle that Jack reads about Mary's resignation from the Woman's Corp. When Jack states that he's surprised that Mary would quit, Lt. Walter Cameron (Roscoe Karns), another pilot, suggests she was fired for sexual misconduct. Jack takes offense at that and almost comes to blows with Walter. David hopes that means Jack's affections have switched to Mary. But Jack insists that is not the case and shows David his good luck charm, the locket that Sylvia had intended for David. Jack had kept the locket a secret up to then and when he shows it to David, the photo falls to the floor. David finds it and reads the inscription on the back, that Sylvia had written to him. Seeing no way to put the photo back without Jack seeing the inscription, David almost fights his friend to avoid him seeing it. But they are called to their planes before that happens. David, who has already stated he fears he might not return from the mission, leaves behind his teddy bear.

On their way to shoot down some German observation balloons, David runs interference with four German planes, leaving Jack to go after the balloons. While David is initially successful he is eventually shot down. Crashing behind enemy lines, he is thought to have been killed when a German patrol comes upon him and shoots when he doesn’t surrender. A German flying ace delivers the news by flying his plane into the enemy camp to deliver the news in a tube.

But David is not dead and manages to make his way to a German airfield, where he steals a plane to fly back to the Allied side. However, on his way back he runs into Jack, who sees the German plane as another way to avenge his fallen friend, and he mercilessly shoots it down. When he lands to take a souvenir, he discovers that the dying pilot is David. Jack stays with his friend until he dies.

When the war is over, Jack returns to a hero’s welcome. He is relieved that David’s parents don’t blame him for the death of their son. And finally, Jack realizes that it is Mary he loves.

While all of this may sound melodramatic it isn’t. There are obviously places where it could have gone that way, but it doesn’t. And it is not all drama either. Comic relief is supplied by El Brendel and Gunboat Smith. El Brendel, a vaudevillian comic, plays Herman Schwimpf, who gets into scuffs along the way when his intentions are misunderstood. Mostly, he gets into it with his Sergeant (Gunboat Smith). Gunboat, a former heavyweight fighter turned actor, is perhaps best known for losing to Jack Dempsey in 1917 and again in 1918. El Brendel, ironically, left Paramount the same year as this film and went back to vaudeville. He would return to films again and again in his career, first at Fox and later in shorts for Columbia Pictures.

What helps set this film apart are the visuals in it. The shots revolving around flying and dogfights are simply stunning. William Wellman, a former pilot in World War I, brought realism to the movie. As stated before the actors who could fly were actually flying the planes. In addition to onboard cameras, Wellman also used platforms and balloons to capture some incredible shots.

In addition to flying, the shots of the battlefields are likewise spectacular. The bombed out landscape, as well as the subtleties of war, are truly captured here. And perhaps it took someone who had been there to bring it to life. The immensity of the battle scenes reminded me of the Civil War footage that D.W. Griffith shot in his flawed epic BIRTH OF A NATION. The realism captured would be either now be supplemented with stock footage or created using green screens and CGI.

And the camera work is not only spectacular for the flying and battle sequences. Be sure to pay attention to such scenes as when Jack goes to show Sylvia his Shooting Star car and when we enter the Les Folies Bergère. Like SUNRISE (1927), the camera work is sophisticated and something that would be lost for a time when sound forced everyone to gather round the microphone.

While WINGS was definitely Wellman’s first major film, it would hardly be his last. He would go on to direct such classics as THE PUBLIC ENEMY (1931), WILD BOYS OF THE ROAD (1933). A STAR IS BORN (1937), BEAUE GESTE (1939), ROXIE HART (1942), and the OX-BOW INCIDENT (1943). Wellman, also called Wild Bill, liked to work fast, disdained actors but hated actresses more. Known for bullying his actors, he did manage to the performance he wanted from them and seven of them would receive Oscar nominations for their troubles. Wellman himself, who was not nominated for WINGS, would receive them for A STAR IS BORN, BATTLEGROUND (1949) and THE HIGH AND THE MIGHTY (1954). His only Oscar came for Best Writing, Original Story for A STAR IS BORN, which he shared with Robert Carson.

Like other films made in the late silent era, WINGS is a sophisticated work. There are not lots of title cards, because, by that time, audiences knew how to watch a movie. They didn’t have to see every bit of dialogue written out for them to be able to follow the movie. The film also employs sound in some very interesting ways.

To begin with, silent films were not usually totally silent. Music usually accompanied their showings. While it may have started out as a way of drowning out other noises that might interrupt your viewing pleasure (coughing, talking, etc.), Hollywood quickly realized that music could be used to enhance the film. Oftentimes, films came with suggested pieces that could be played by the theater’s piano player or organist to set the mood. For really big films, music was written for them and played by an organist or a small orchestra for truly big budget films. Such is the case of WINGS.

A score was written for the film by J.S. Zamecnik that incorporated both original music themes as well as songs, such as George Cohan’s Over There and symphonic passages. This score was arranged for both orchestra and for organ. While there were no recordings to be used for this restoration, the score has been brought back to life and Zamecnik receiving the credit that eluded him at the time.

The film score also employs sound effects that were designed to enhance the film, such as machine gun fire and planes in flight. These were also done live when the film first was shown. Though as part of the move from silent to synchronized sound it is possible that by the end of its two-year theatrical run, some of the sound effects were no longer live.

To see WINGS is to be impressed, not only with the original film but with the restoration process. There are occasionally jump cuts perhaps from a missing frame or two, but considering the film was all but lost, its resurrection is all that more impressive.

A success at the time of its release, WINGS’ return to life is a triumph.