HELL DIVERS (1931)

There was a number of military aviation films back in the late 1920's/early 1930's...THE FLYING ACE (1926), WINGS (1927), THE FLYING FLEET (1929), HELL'S ANGELS (1930), THE DAWN PATROL (1930) and HELL DIVERS featuring top-billed Wallace Beery and a young pre-mustache Clark Gable.

Wallace Beery is the top dog in a fighting squadron of dive bombers, so when a new guy (Gable) comes in and wins the "champion machine gunner" title he gets butthurt.  It also doesn't help that Wallace is a total screw-up.  Always drinking and partying, borrowing money non-stop, lying, randomly punching people.  He's not a pleasant guy to be around.  Because of this, Gable and Beery are constantly butting heads.

Life goes on.  The squadron train in their dive bombers and eventually fly down to Panama to do some more training over the water.  Throughout it all Beery and Gable are at eat others throats.  It's tiresome.  After awhile you learn that the story is unimportant and the real entertainment is in all of the vintage footage of the old airplanes, Navy ships and even a Zeppelin!

Moderate pace, severely dated story, annoying "Aw, shucks!" acting by Beery (who I usually like), exciting aerial scenes.  Overall, it's a watchable movie, just very dated.  Aviation and military nuts will get a kick out of the planes and stuff but the average moviegoer will probably be bored.

Would make an interesting double-feature with 1941's DIVE BOMBER.  It even looks like they used some of the same filming locations.  Also planes in both films feature a top hat painted on the side.

Somebody is dangling off the side.

Jack Pennick

MANHATTAN MELODRAMA (1934)

With so much talent behind the camera (W.S. Van Dyke, Joseph L. Mankiewicz and George Cukor) and on the screen (Myrna Loy, Clark Gable, William Powell, Nat Pendleton, Mickey Rooney, etc.) I was really expecting more out of MANHATTAN MELODRAMA, but unfortunately the entire thing is too melodramatic to be taken seriously.

The story is your basic Cain and Abel hokum with two orphans growing up as brothers. One goes the straight and narrow to become a prominent political figure and the other the local kingpin of illegal gambling. Throw in the fact that they are both in love with the same woman and you got…well, nothing really. You would expect for there to be fireworks, but the script plays it safe from beginning to end and there’s never any tension or surprise moments.

Worth watching for fans of classic Hollywood, but everybody else would probably be bored.

Interesting trivia: John Dillinger was leaving the Biograph Theater in Chicago, Ill. when he was confronted by federal agents and then shot in the back. Here is a picture of the Biograph Theater with MANHATTAN MELODRAMA on the billboard: