Only Angels Have Wings (1939)

Only Angels Have Wings (1939)

starring Cary Grant, Jean Arthur, Thomas Mitchell, Richard Barthlemess, Rita Hayworth

directed by Howard Hawks

Bonnie Lee (Jean Arthur) gets off the ocean liner on which she is travelling in Barranca, somewhere in South America. She explores the town and winds up at an airport run by an American flying company owned by Geoff Carter (Cary Grant). She ends up sticking around for a week after she lets the ocean liner take off without her, in part because she has developed a fondness for Geoff.

Life at the airport gets more complicated after one pilot is killed when his plane crashes. His replacement, Bat MacPherson (Richard Barthlemess) and his wife Judy (Rita Hayworth), have ties to the crew of the airport. Judy dated Geoff before she got married. Bat bailed out of an airplane in a parachute once, leaving the other man in the airplane to die when the plane crashed. Kid (Thaomas Mitchell) is the brother of the man who died in that airplane crash.

Thoughts

They probably could have done a better job layering the the different plot elements together. There's a section of the movie where Jean Arthur disappeared for probably twenty minutes or more. The MacPhersons don't make their first appearance until probably 40 minutes into the movie.

Only Angels Have Wings is a bit overloaded but was still a very good film. I found the ending to be emotionally moving.

Notes

I have seen Cary Grant and Jean Arthur in numerous other movies.

Thomas Mitchell was also in Stagecoach (1939), for which he won the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor, and has a memorable role in It's a Wonderful Life (1946) as Uncle Billy.

Richard Barthelmess was primarily known as a star of the Silent Era. He only appeared in three movies after Only Angels Have Wings, although he didn't die until 1963. He was one of the founding members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences.

Sig Ruman played the part of Dutchy, who runs the bar at the airport. I have also seen him Stalag 17 (1953), To Be or Not to Be (1942), and A Night at the Opera (1935).