Wings: Still Flying High 85 Years Later

Photo courtesy of Paramount Home Media

With all the Oscar buzz about The Artist this year, a silent film which just might become “Best Picture,” ever wonder if a silent film has ever won that coveted award?

Wings  was the very first Best Picture Winner back in 1928, the only silent film to ever capture that title. It cost $2 million to make, a fortune in those days, and is considered to be the Star Wars of it’s era. Many Hollywood celebrities including Helen Mirren and hubby Taylor Hackford (director of “Ray“) attended Paramount Picture’s 100th anniversary party this week featuring a screening of “Wings”, which has now been completely digitally restored. for Blu-Ray.

Wings is the story of two men, a girl and the First World War. 1920′s siren Clara Bow (the “It Girl”) got top billing, but the most screen time went to handsome Buddy Rogers and the very sympathetic Harold Arlen, both newcomers at the time. Best friends and patriots, both men join the fight side by side as military pilots at the end of WW1. However, the men are on very different sides when it comes to Mary (Clara).  Wings was the very first film to display complex aviation aeronautics. The actors actually were in each plane for the action. Pilots flew to a certain height, then ducked out of sight before filming began. The battle scenes, and plane crashes were real.

Wings was filmed in black & white, but also has some hand colored sections, which add greatly to the the fire and attack scenes that dominate the film. Wings won a 2nd Oscar for “engineering effects” not just for those shots, but also for a very racy Paris bar scene where Buddy Rogers imagines glorious bubbles encompassing Clara, (and every other attractive female in attendance). The complex array of subject matter contained in Wings, is very unusual for films of that era.

Director William Wellman AKA: “Wild Bill” was only 29 when he was asked to tackle Wings. He made a masterpiece. The new restored version was screened twice this week at The Samuel Goldwyn Theater, with a brilliant 2 and 1/2 hour organ performance from Clark Wilson. Clark’s performance was based on the original score, and brilliantly illustrated the mood of each scene.

Wings is now available on Blu-Ray. If you look close early in the film, you just might catch a very early cameo of future star Gary Cooper. His monumental performance in High Noon was years away, but you can see it coming in his brief appearance.