If you have seen the movie ?The Aviator? then you know that Howard Hughes made a movie about World War I aviation back in the days of silent films but completely redid it before release because of the emergence of sound with movies. When it was released in 1929 it was the most expensive film ever produced. I was born in 1936 and I have heard of this movie off and on all my life but I had never seen it. Imagine my surprise to see it on DVD in Blockbuster this week in the ?Classics? section. Well, I had some doubts because old movies just haven?t lived up to my expectations in recent years but I rented it. It is magnificent! It was directed by Howard Hughes himself, and something like 127 pilots were employed to make the film. The special effects are amazing even without realizing that electronic computes were still decades in the future when it was made, the Zeppelin is awesome and the basic story is very good. If you are a pilot you can see the the aviation side of the film is unusually rich - exposing things that a normal movie maker would never think of, like the close ups of many systems in operation in the German Bomber and the Zeppelin.
Bob Axsom
Bob Axsom
