WWI and WWII book/movie recs? And Flyboys
Oct. 3rd, 2006 01:16 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
dangermousieDoes anyone have any good recommendations for books (fiction or non) or movies about WWI pilots? Or the R.A.F. in WWII?
Saw Flyboys.
And it is love.
I can see why the critics didn't care for it. It's an old-fashioned movie. If you took it back to the 30s, 40s, 50s, it would do very well. And it has heroes and nobility and all that stuff. For someone like me? It's catnip.
I am generally a sucker for movies about World War I pilots, but this one was a worthy entry into that pretty small subgenre.
It got everything I love about movies like this:
Angsty, hot, heroic pilots? Check. (James Franco as Rawlings and Mark Henderson as Cassidy? So having-their-babies worthy).
Cool dogfights, fights against larger planes, zeppelin and similar? Check.
Manly friendship? Check. (![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
aliterati, you have ruined me. Much as I loved the OTP of Rawlings and Lucienne, I was totally imagining Rawlings and Cassidy getting it on).
A PTSD, cynical gorgeous Ace (Henderson) and a younger talented flyer feeling the horrors of war for the first time (Franco) and a nemesis of a German pilot and loss and revenge? Check.
A totally swoony love story between American flyer and French girl, with rescuing from the Germans and kissing of hands and touching in the rain? Check.
This movie was a mix of Wings (the father of them all, and dealing with the same topic), Big Parade (when Rawlings was trying to communicate with Lucienne despite his lack of French or her lack of English, I was thrown back to the scenes in the BP between John Gilbert and Renee Adoree. BP s better and bleaker, and has one of the most romantic scenes ever filmed, but the comparison made me happy), Lilac Time (foreign pilot with Lafayette escadrille falling for a French girl), Dawn Patrol (PtsD WWI pilots, including an older, tired Ace), Hell's Angels (duh), and The eagle and the hawk (the interplay between exhausted pilots, especially the doomed, messed up war hero and a younger pilot). And a bit of the Yank in the R.A.F. thrown in. And I love all of those. Actually, I think I want to rewatch Lilac Time now (a silent movie with Gary Cooper as a pilot falling in love with a French girl and at the end he crashes his plane and she thinks he is dead and there is angst and tearful reunions and the whole thing is to die for).
No, this movie does not have the very powerful ending of Wings (I don't care for the little tag, but the ending itself, with Buddy Rogers getting heroic welcome home as this Ace, while Richard Arlen's parents sit all by themselves in this gigantic house, and then BR coming in and sobbing at their feet and you can't look at his eyes and his hair is grey is just a killer) or the very gorgeous ending of Big Parade (Renee Adoree and John Gilbert make me sob), but it's still very good.
There was only one thing that bugged me. I know it's based on a true story, but hello! You can't pull out all the stops to make me fall HARD for an OTP (Rawlings/Lucienne) and then do the whole 'he went to Paris to look for her like she said but never found her.' GRRRRR. No way. It's horrible. Also, woman, I know you have three small children clinging at your skirts and you are being evacuated in a hurry because the Germans are about to get there, and you are wounded and you speak about 5 words of English and he speaks about 5 words of French, but how about picking an easily findable meeting place? ARGH.
All in all,really worth a watch, and I finally see what girls see in James Franco. And I want to fic the film.
Saw Flyboys.
And it is love.
I can see why the critics didn't care for it. It's an old-fashioned movie. If you took it back to the 30s, 40s, 50s, it would do very well. And it has heroes and nobility and all that stuff. For someone like me? It's catnip.
I am generally a sucker for movies about World War I pilots, but this one was a worthy entry into that pretty small subgenre.
It got everything I love about movies like this:
Angsty, hot, heroic pilots? Check. (James Franco as Rawlings and Mark Henderson as Cassidy? So having-their-babies worthy).
Cool dogfights, fights against larger planes, zeppelin and similar? Check.
Manly friendship? Check. (
aliterati, you have ruined me. Much as I loved the OTP of Rawlings and Lucienne, I was totally imagining Rawlings and Cassidy getting it on). A PTSD, cynical gorgeous Ace (Henderson) and a younger talented flyer feeling the horrors of war for the first time (Franco) and a nemesis of a German pilot and loss and revenge? Check.
A totally swoony love story between American flyer and French girl, with rescuing from the Germans and kissing of hands and touching in the rain? Check.
This movie was a mix of Wings (the father of them all, and dealing with the same topic), Big Parade (when Rawlings was trying to communicate with Lucienne despite his lack of French or her lack of English, I was thrown back to the scenes in the BP between John Gilbert and Renee Adoree. BP s better and bleaker, and has one of the most romantic scenes ever filmed, but the comparison made me happy), Lilac Time (foreign pilot with Lafayette escadrille falling for a French girl), Dawn Patrol (PtsD WWI pilots, including an older, tired Ace), Hell's Angels (duh), and The eagle and the hawk (the interplay between exhausted pilots, especially the doomed, messed up war hero and a younger pilot). And a bit of the Yank in the R.A.F. thrown in. And I love all of those. Actually, I think I want to rewatch Lilac Time now (a silent movie with Gary Cooper as a pilot falling in love with a French girl and at the end he crashes his plane and she thinks he is dead and there is angst and tearful reunions and the whole thing is to die for).
No, this movie does not have the very powerful ending of Wings (I don't care for the little tag, but the ending itself, with Buddy Rogers getting heroic welcome home as this Ace, while Richard Arlen's parents sit all by themselves in this gigantic house, and then BR coming in and sobbing at their feet and you can't look at his eyes and his hair is grey is just a killer) or the very gorgeous ending of Big Parade (Renee Adoree and John Gilbert make me sob), but it's still very good.
There was only one thing that bugged me. I know it's based on a true story, but hello! You can't pull out all the stops to make me fall HARD for an OTP (Rawlings/Lucienne) and then do the whole 'he went to Paris to look for her like she said but never found her.' GRRRRR. No way. It's horrible. Also, woman, I know you have three small children clinging at your skirts and you are being evacuated in a hurry because the Germans are about to get there, and you are wounded and you speak about 5 words of English and he speaks about 5 words of French, but how about picking an easily findable meeting place? ARGH.
All in all,really worth a watch, and I finally see what girls see in James Franco. And I want to fic the film.
