the audience applauded

People are voting emotionally.

There are moments in this movie where the great movie it could've been peek out... They're fleeting, here, but they're worth savoring, and they happen often enough to make it worth your while.

This is one of the best movies I’ve seen in a very long time. You have to go and see this on the big screen.

HELL'S ANGELS (United Artists, 1930), A Caddo Production produced and directed by Howard Hughes, is possibly important in movie history for being a very expensive large-scale production. It began production as a silent movie in 1927 but released three years later as an early aviation talkie with Technicolor and extensive yet exciting aerial sequences. Although much of the names in the cast are virtually unfamiliar to contemporary audiences, especially leading players of Ben Lyon and James Hall, HELL''S ANGELS has become best known recently for historians solely as the first major movie success for newcomer by the name of Jean Harlow (1911-1937). Still in her teens with few minor roles to her credit, this platinum blonde/ bombshell shows star quality for a movie career that was to become short-lived.The story opens in 1914 Germany, before the war, with the plot development centering upon brothers, Monte (Ben Lyon) and Roy Rutledge (James Hall), both students of England's Oxford University. Roy is deeply in love with a girl named Helen, and wants Roy to meet her. They finally do at a festivity hosted by Lady Randolph (Evelyn Hall). Due to circumstances beyond his control, Roy is forced to leave Monte with Helen (Jean Harlow), who takes an immediate attraction towards him. She later invites Roy to her apartment where the two become involved in a romantic interlude. Guilty for his actions, Monte finds Helen cheap and walks out on her. Monte, however, finds himself unable to tell Roy how unfaithful Helen is towards him. As the brothers, now in the British Royal Flying Corps,go through battle in the clouds and see enough action and death against the enemy fliers, this brings forth the cowardice actions in Monte, especially after the brothers are later captured and held prisoners by the Germans.Also in cast support are: John Darrow (Karl Arnstedt, Roy's college friend); Lucien Prival (Baron Victor Von Kranz); Roy Wilson ("Baldy" Maloney); Douglas Gilmore (Captain Redfield, one of Helen's lovers); William B. Davidson (The Major); and Marilyn Morgan, later known as Marian Marsh (SVENGALI, 1931) , briefly spotted as a girl who sells kisses. Ben Lyon as Monte heads the cast as a womanizing brother who is caught romancing a woman by her husband, who then challenges him to a duel. James Hall, who looks more in his fifties than his younger age, makes due as the devoted brother, devoted enough to save his brother's cowardice grace by taking his place in the duel instead. His Roy character is also devoted to Helen, but learns the hard way what type of girl she really is to him. As much as some claim Jean Harlow not to be a good actress, which could be noticed in some of her latter performances, she does just fine here as the flirtatious young girl who wants to enjoy life to the fullest. Lucien Prival's physical style of acting makes one think of other German actor, Erich Von Stroheim, who would have been great had he played the Baron. As much as the situations involving the brothers and aerial photography inside the Zeppelin take up much of the proceedings, Harlow manages to gather enough attention towards her character, enough to remember her long after her final scene is over.Capitalizing in similar war related themes, including WINGS (1927), THE DAWN PATROL (1930), and the most famous ALL QUIET ON THE WESTERN FRONT (1930), HELL'S ANGELS holds its own in is expensive- looking presentation. Being a super production at 130 minutes, regardless of its age and when it was released, HELL'S ANGELS seems more advanced in its structure, special effects, early color sequences and its overlong flying sequences filmed in sepia. The spoken German dialogue is translated in English through the traditional silent movie technique of inter-titles flashed on the screen. When reissued in 1940, HELL'S ANGELS was reduced to 97 minutes in complete black and white format. Years later it was restored to original length, including color and Ten Minute intermission title card at the midway point.Unseen for decades, HELL'S ANGELS resurrected in the 1980s on cable television, first on USA (1985) and then a big premiere presentation in 1989 on American Movie Classics. In later years, it became available on video cassette and DVD, as well as broadcasts on Turner Classic Movies (TCM premiere: February 28, 2000), more as tributes to hell's angel herself, Jean Harlow, than to aviation movies and war related themes. (***)

Howard Hughes was a perfectionist and it shows in these aerial shots, with biplanes whizzing around in Immelmans and spins, machine guns chattering, black smoke trailing. The cameras were obviously mounted on the airplanes in flight.It sings a bit less on the ground. Two American brothers, Roy and Monte, are at Oxford when the war breaks out in 1914. (Kids, that would be the First World War. The First World War was the one that came before World War Two.) Roy is a highly principled and moral young man. His brother Monte is a little flighty. They have a good friend from Germany, Karl, who is conscripted and is sacrificed by the captain of the zeppelin that is bombing London. Too bad for Karl. A nice guy, really.Roy and Monte wind up in the RFC. Roy, the virtuous one, falls for a peroxide blond, Jean Harlow, but she's as capricious as Monte, and when Roy catches the two of them smooching, he's naturally saddened. But the brothers overcome this contretemps and fly on.They both volunteer for a suicide mission that will pave the way for the attack of a British brigade and save thousands of lives.Aside from the thrill of the scenes in the air, what most catches the eye, or rather the ear, is the industrial strength language of the pilots. It sounds pretty rough, the kind of thing you wouldn't expect to hear outside of today's political arena.There's no blood to speak of. The Germans are Prussian stereotypes, led by the hawkish Lucien Prival, but they're not inhuman. And it's exciting to see this gigantic, clumsy German bomber, a Gotha GV, being shot to pieces and still bringing the airmen down safely, at least for the moment.

Hell's Angels is an war film starring Jean Harlow, Ben Lyon, and James Hall. The screenplay centers on the combat pilots of World War I. Originally shot as a silent film,it was retooled over a lengthy gestation period and it is now hailed as one of the first sound blockbuster action films.It was written by Harry Behn and Howard Estabrook; and it was produced and directed by Howard Hughes. Monte and Roy Rutledge are a couple of British brothers who drop out of Oxford to join the British Royal Flying Corps. Both have a romantic rivalry over the affections of the two-timing socialite Helen. While flying a dangerous bombing mission over Germany, the brothers are shot down. The commandant savors his opportunity for revenge. He offers the boys their freedom if they'll reveal the time of the next British attack.If they don't cooperate, they face unspeakable consequences. Roy, driven mad by his combat experiences, is about to tell all when he is shot and killed by Monte. The latter is himself condemned to a firing squad by the disgruntled commandant, who will soon meet his own doom at the hands of the British bombers.Two bright facets light up this 1930's aviation melodrama. One is the extraordinary footage re-creating World War I air battles and the other is Jean Harlow. Both are enough to offset the cornball story and stilted dialogue. The movie was almost three years in the making and with a budget of nearly $4 million,which was astronomical at that time,was the obsession of eccentric millionaire producer/director Howard Hughes. Apparently, the authenticity of the dogfight scenes was so important to Hughes that he piloted a plane himself, and ended up breaking a few bones in the process. More shocking, it's said that three pilots lost their lives making the movie. The sequence depicting an epic encounter between the British Royal Flying Corps and a German zeppelin is especially stunning, thanks to the eye-popping use of hand tinting. A bombing raid on a German munitions depot is also remarkably convincing. Overall,the movie maybe dated after more than 80 years but it remains enjoyable and entertaining due to the authenticity and the spectacular flying sequences in it.

World War I was the source of two great war films, All Quiet On The Western Front and Hell's Angels in 1930. The first was the Best Picture for that year according to the Motion Picture Academy, the second is known for its special effects and had the Special Effects Oscar been a category that year, Hell's Angels would have won no doubt.The other thing that Hell's Angels is noted for is the screen debut of Jean Harlow in a major part. She had done several bit roles prior to Hell's Angels when Howard Hughes who produced and directed this gave her the big break. Harlow is perfect as the flighty upper class woman who flirts between brothers Ben Lyon and James Hall. Hughes photographed her to best advantage the way he would do for Jane Russell later on in The Outlaw. Harlow was not the accomplished comedienne she later became, but all she has to do in Hell's Angels is be alluring and sexy and that she did without practice.When it came to the special aerial effects and filming of same, no film could touch Hell's Angels. The film received it's one Academy Award nomination for cinematography. It lost to the documentary film, With Byrd At The South Pole. If there had been a documentary category that year, the Admiral Byrd film would have been in that category and probably an easy winner. As it was the real life heroics of Richard E. Byrd trumped any make believe that Howard Hughes put on the screen.But Howard Hughes was not a man of thespian profession and was no director of actors. He was also no judge of scripts. The plot is an overwrought melodramatic one involving two brothers, one a heroic if somewhat dull figure, the other one both a ladies man and a weakling as well. Maybe with a real director the acting would have been of a better caliber.The most famous sequence is the aerial battle between the German Zeppelin and the Royal Flying Corps squadron sent up to bring the big dirigible down. Even there with the well done battle sequences there's a bit of ridiculousness where the German crew after everything else has been tossed overboard to lighten the load and gain altitude is asked to sacrifice themselves. And you see them jumping out the plane for the Kaiser and the Reich as they put it WITHOUT PARACHUTES. I mean PLEASE give me a break. The German commander who had a run in with the brothers before the war when they were touring Germany as Oxford students is played by Lucien Prival. He must have been the guy that the producers called for when they couldn't get Erich Von Stroheim. He had all of Von Stroheim's bullnecked Teutonic personality down to the last sneer. He did fine with the part, but it must have been something with this guy to be cast in these parts and only when the producers couldn't get Von Stroheim.Aviation fans will love this film, but for all its technical wizardry it's not close to being as good as All Quiet On The Western Front.