Only Angels Have Wings
Tags: melodrama

Plot synopsis:
Geoff Carter (Grant) is a pilot and the manager of Barranca Airways, a small, barely solvent company owned by "Dutchy" Van Ruyter (Sig Ruman) carrying airmail from the fictional South American port town of Barranca through a high pass in the Andes Mountains. Bonnie Lee (Arthur), a piano-playing entertainer, arrives one day. Joe Souther (Noah Beery Jr), a pilot who had been planning to have dinner with her, crashes trying to land in fog on her first day at the air base. Bonnie becomes infatuated with Carter, despite his fatalistic attitude about the dangerous mountain flying, and stays on in Barranca (not at Carter's invitation, as he insists on telling her).
The situation is complicated by the appearance of pilot Bat MacPherson (Richard Barthelmess) and his wife, Geoff's old flame Judy (Rita Hayworth). MacPherson is revealed to be an alias; his real surname is Kilgallen. He is infamous among the pilots for having once bailed out of a plane, leaving his mechanic — the brother of "Kid" Dabb (Thomas Mitchell), Carter's best friend — to be killed in the resulting crash. When Geoff is forced to ground the Kid because of failing eyesight, he is short on pilots and agrees to hire MacPherson on the condition that he fly the most dangerous missions. MacPherson understands and accepts the setup: none of the other pilots would shed a tear if he were lost.
Dutchy will secure a lucrative government mail contract that would put the airline on a solid financial footing, if he proves he can provide reliable mail service during a six month trial period. On the last day of Barranca Airways' probation, bad weather closes the mountain pass. Geoff plans to fly a new Ford Trimotor over the mountains at an altitude of 17,000 feet. The Kid asks to go with him, as co-pilot. When Geoff refuses him, the Kid suggests letting the toss of a coin decide the matter. Geoff tries to grab the coin in mid-air. However, it lands on the floor, and he picks it up and finds that it has two heads — which would insure the Kid’s being on board. Realizing how important it is to the Kid, Geoff agrees to take him along. Just before leaving, Bonnie tries to talk Geoff out of going. As they hug, she takes his gun out of his holster, points it at him and tells Geoff that she won't let him go. Knowing that she really can't stop him, she lowers the gun. However, when she drops the gun on the table, it accidentally fires, hitting Geoff in the shoulder.
Unable to fly, Geoff agrees to let Bat and the Kid try flying over the mountains instead of threading the pass. However, they are unable to climb above 15,600 feet before the plane stalls and falls off. The Kid radios Geoff and tells him that the plane could not get enough altitude to go over the mountains. Although Geoff tells them to turn around and return, the Kid and Bat decide to try to fly through the fogged-in pass. On the way through, they encounter a flock of condors. One crashes through the windshield, injuring the Kid; another tangles with the No. 1 engine, setting it on fire. Later the No. 2 engine also catches fire. The Kid tells Bat to bail out but Bat refuses, turns the plane around and manages to land the burning Trimotor back in Barranca. The Kid dies from a broken neck, but not before telling Geoff of Bat's valor. As a result, Bat is finally accepted by the other pilots.
Bonnie is torn between leaving and staying, and confronts Geoff in the hope he will ask her to stay. However, Geoff is quoted earlier as saying that "he would never ask a women for anything," and doesn't make the request she is hoping for. Then the weather clears and Geoff is about to rush out to secure the all-important contract. Before he goes, he offers to toss a coin to decide: heads, she stays; tails, she leaves. Bonnie is unwilling to decide her life so haphazardly, saying with tears "I'm hard to get, Geoff — all you have to do is ask me!" As he leaves, Geoff gives her the coin as a "souvenir." At first she is distraught, but then she's thrilled when she discovers that the coin has heads on both sides and realizes it was Geoff's way of asking her to stay.

Review: In this film Cary Grant, who is one of the greatest "Hawksian" actors, plays Geoff the head of the air mail airline who has sworn off women because they just don't seem to deal with his dangerous lifestyle.
A Notch Above The Rest In Its Era. To quote to the movie cliché on the back of the VHS cover, this is old-time adventure, "the kind they don't make anymore."Well, they've always made good adventure stories through the years but you get the message: it's simply a good, solid story done well on film .What puts this a notch above other adventure tales of its day are: 1 - excellent cinematography; 2 - interesting aerial scenes with neat-looking planes flying in the fog and around and above the treacherous Andes Mountains; 3 - a top- notch cast featuring Cary Grant, Jean Arthur, Rita Hayworth, Richard Barthelmess, Thomas Mitchell, Allyn Joslyn, Sig Ruman, John Carroll and Noah Beery Jr., and 4 - a story that is generally interesting.I say "generally" because there are a few dry spots, mainly Arthur's continued pining over Grant, but most of it fun to watch and it gets you involved in the story.
The story revolves around not just Cary Grant's Geoff leading the pack in the Andes, but also Thomas Mitchell's brother gone, Richard Barthelmess' past recur, Rita Hayworth's nostalgic fear, and the spunky, sentimental Jean Arthur's Bonnie wraps it all up.
Only Angels Have Wings is both a good character study and has a lot of drama as well.And Cary Grant was far more successful at a Bogart type role than Bogey was in doing Sabrina..
This movie makes much more sense when you put it in the context of early talkie World War I flying movies like Hawks' Today We Live or The Dawn Patrol orDieterle's The Last Flight (starring, not coincidentally, Richard Barthelmess).
The reviewers who say Grant doesn't play it serious enough here are exactly missing the point-- his seemingly breezy, actually brittle facade IS the Lost Generation attitude, straight out of The Sun Also Rises.This is one of the great tough romances, whose real romance is with death itself, which needless to say makes it several steps darker than Hawks' superficially similar To Have and Have Not, let alone Rio Bravo (which reproduces its maincharacters almost exactly-- Grant as John Wayne, Arthur/Angie Dickinson as the woman trying to get into the boy's club, Barthelmess/Dean Martin as the guywith a guilty past of failure, and Mitchell as the guy who age is catching up with/ Walter Brennan, old age fully caught up).
For a remarkably compelling story about a fly-by-the-seat-of-their-pants airmail service in South America, director Howard Hawks has assembled a cast that includes Cary Grant as the airline's owner and Jean Arthur as a tourist stranded between boats who catches his eye.
Great flying sequences, some marvelous special effects, and a great cast are the highlights of "Only Angels Have Wings," directed by Howard Hawks and starring Cary Grant, Jean Arthur, Thomas Mitchell, Richard Barthelmess, and Rita Hayworth.
Geoff Carter is the head of a small run down air freight company in Barranca, one of his best pilots (and friend) is killed, but this is merely only one of the problems he has to deal with as ex flames, potential new sweethearts, and dissension in the camp, all fuse together to test him to the limit.Howard Hawks was the perfect man for this film because of his aviation background, the result is a very well crafted character study set in a very small locale.
Therefore, when sexy Jean Arthur shows up on a stop-over and gets a hankering for boss Cary Grant, the sexual tension rests in whether or not Grant will be alive long enough to make forming a romantic attachment worthwhile.With a second world war looming on the horizon, one can see how this story was both relevant and irrelevant at the same time: relevant as a parallel for the many American men who would soon be in the position of not knowing whether or not they would be alive from day to day; but sort of irrelvant too, since we're talking about delivering mail here, not going to war!!
Rita Hayworth shows up in an early role as another love interest for Grant, and one-time silent film star Richard Barthelmess struts in playing Grant's mail carrier arch rival (!), looking for all the world like he's still acting in silent films.Director Howard Hawks creates an authentically foggy and sweaty South American atmosphere, and for all the surface silliness of the plot, he fashions a pretty compelling movie about the instinct to challenge death that dominates these characters' lives.
Howard Hawks' surprisingly dark film about mail pilots in the Banana Republic and their often dangerous lives is one of the great "lost" classics of Hollywood's golden era.
The film is uncommonly unsentimental and realistic when compared to other films from the same era, and is all the better for it.Cary Grant and Jean Arthur, both of whom are cast somewhat against type and in complex roles, deliver sensational performances that should have won them both Academy Awards (the fact that neither actor was even nominated is inexplicable).
If this film was made today, it would no doubt involve a great deal more sex and a great deal more CGI - it would be a terrible filmFortunately, this film was made in 1939 and is a superb example of the era - I won't go into the details of the plot (its not that important) but rather i will describe the people involved (more important) - Grant is cynical, distant and seemingly unemotional, he doesn't want to be tied down, he simply wants to get the job done - Arthur is sassy, talented and independent, she knows what she wants or at least she thinks she does - one kiss from Grant changes her mind (as it would)Then there's the pilot carrying the guilt of another mans death (we never find out how responsible he was) no one likes him and he's given the hardest flying jobs that no one else will take - on the up-side, he's married to Rita Hayworth but she doesn't know what his secret is (oh....and she used to have a thing with Grant) The new pilot finds redemption, his wife finds happiness, Grant finds a woman that can handle him, Arthur finds a man that deserves her and some people die along the way Fabulous stuff - i recommend watching it late at night (preferably when it's raining).
1939 is often called the best year in Hollywood history, but this superb, and superbly-original, movie gets overshadowed by THE WIZARD OF OZ, GONE WITH THE WIND, DARK VICTORY and other classics from that year.ONLY ANGELS HAVE WINGS can be enjoyed as a terrific, fast-paced action/adventure movie, but beneath the surface there's much more going on.The story deals with big themes -- honor, character, love, guilt, redemption -- in profound ways worthy of Tolstoy or Shakespeare.
The nail-biting drama and suspense are leavened with just the right amount of comedy.Here you see Rita Hayworth's star quality emerging for the first time, while D.W. Griffith's early-silent film leading man Richard Barthelmess underacts brilliantly as a man haunted by a guilty secret.The first time I saw OAHW, I remember thinking the scene with the condor was far-fetched, but after the bird-caused plane crash in the Hudson River recently, I realize I was just ignorant about aviation.
Cary Grant wasn't at his best but Jean Arthur was the star of the film along with Thomas Mitchell.
By the end of his career, Gary Grant was well known as an actor who did comedies and lighthearted dramas, where he played characters that were very different to his tough guy pilot in this film.
It features a top-shelf cast of stars and character actors, has some surprisingly well constructed special effects and flying sequences, and the action and drama and romance fit altogether with barely a hitch.If there's maybe one minor criticism, and it's so minor I feel nitpicky mentioning it, the real 'adventure' plot is a little more engrossing than the romance, with Cary Grant's chief flier Carter leading the missions for this group of pilots on missions delivering mail through dangerous terrain, and having to deal with a bitterness at hand with the pilots as an old wound is opened with the re-emergence of Killian aka Mac Pherson (well cast in underplayed Richard Barthelmess performance) and his new wife played by Rita Hayworth.
This goes without saying I don't see why Hawks and Arthur had a problem working together, as she seemed to be cast spot-on as a strong-but-tender female presence in the midst of all these men (and, you know, Rita Hayworth who needs no explanation), who is the only one aside from Kid to get emotionally close to Carter.
While Grant and Arthur's scenes are good, even very good at their best (loved the transition from tenseness with the coffee and then to the admission of love), they're nearly overshadowed by the power and effectiveness of those surrounding the missions and the pilots.And those scenes involve the kind of male camaraderie that Hawks is known and admired and even loved for, in expressing the story so well that these characters and personalities come through clean and clear.
But with Cary Grant, Jean Arthur, Rita Hayworth, and this cast and rousing story, it's believable and excellent work.
Jean Arthur, (Bonnie Lee) meets Geoff and falls in love with him and does her very best to calm him down, because Geoff was a ladies man and then his ex-wife appears after many years who is Judy, (Rita Hayworth).
This film has many great veteran actors who all gave great supporting roles and Thomas Mitchell, (Kid Dabb), Cary Grant and Jean Arthur put their hearts and soul into their roles.
Cary Grant's second of five films with director Howard Hawks is the story of pilots in South America risking their lives flying in hazardous conditions.
Hawks infuses every shot with the realism of the jungle and weather, which affects every move the pilots make, and Grant is terrific as the stern and callous leader Carter.Both are up to their game here and are boosted by a great supporting cast including Jean Arthur as a showgirl who keeps missing her boat, Rita Hayworth who has some history with Cary, and Thomas Mitchell as his best friend, The Kid, eager to help him out in any way.
I can't imagine anyone other than Ms. Arthur in the role of Bonnie Lee. Throw in Cary Grant, Thomas Mitchell, Noah Beery, Jr. and Rita Hayworth and you know you've got a winner.
Cary Grant is often said to be miscast, but isn't the combination of his great good-looks and charm tempered by a genuine amusement at and indifference to the wiles of the female the very quality that gives his portrayal of "Geoff Carter" its special Hemingwayesque character?
Howard Hawks directed this entertaining drama that stars Cary Grant as Geoff Carter, manager of an air freight service stationed in a remote trading post in South America, where his pilots routinely deliver the mail in dangerous and often foggy conditions between the mountains.
Terrific Howard Hawks feature which I hesitate to term action-adventure as the real meat here is in the psychological studies of an out-there bunch of people, living a life about as far removed from the ordinary as you could get.Cary Grant is brilliantly cast against type as the seemingly cold-blooded, hard-hearted leader of a crack bunch of misfit fliers charged to get mail in and out of a remote jungle location in all types of weather.
Into this Men-Only world come two quite different women, both of whom either fall or have in the past fallen for Grant's brand of tough love, wandering spirit Jean Arthur and a young "old flame", Rita Hayworth, who are required to adopt the same masculine, devil-may-care approach to life as the men or get cast aside.
Considering that this film was directed by Howard Hawks and featured Cary Grant, Jean Arthur, Rita Hayworth and a star-filled supporting cast, it's not a big surprise that the film worked so well.
Cary Grant & Jean Arthur star in this Howard Hawks adventure film from 1939.
Cary Grant plays a Clark Gable type role, a no-nonsense leader under extraneous pressure in the part of Geoff Carter while silent era star Richard Barthelmess uses his greatly expressive face which carries the baggage of his character.
Given the circumstances in a world apart, as well occurs on an adventurous love story between Jean Arthur and Cary Grant, also with the radio transmission guiding people, "Only angels have wings" (1939) directed by Howard Hawks, for consumption now, it is delicious as keen mix between comedy and action gray movie, located on a scale for planes mailing on the top of Andes mountains.
Is it the correct way, by such a dramatic nightmare, to bring the mailing post over the mountains and risking his life for nothing more than only winning for civilization the experiments of first communications, along a continent so exploited in its resources by the sellers of technological inventions, situated as owners for the most in the North of this same world of adventurers and happy few ?Hawks in this movie put the symbolically wings in such an imaginative flux of talking from this guy as pilot of high experiments, risking the good name of this company of aviation - as matches over the soil like lamps illuminating the night - competing with such a terrible birds of high mountains.
Most natural performance among the males in the supporting cast comes from John Carroll, a breezy, natural actor who never received enough recognition in later films of the '40s.Jean Arthur fans will like her in this one--she uses all her standard mannerisms to great effect but without too much help from the lumbering script.
Cary Grant plays Geoff Carter, a pilot and a manager of a small airport in South America.The beautiful Bonnie Lee (Jean Arthur) stops at that airport while waiting for her boat.She stays there longer because she fancies the handsome pilot.But he's too fond of flying.And then his old flame, Judy MacPherson (Rita Hayworth) appears on the scene with her flying husband Bat (Richard Barthelmess).All that and much more happens in Only Angels Have Wings (1939).It's regarded as being among the finest films of its director Howard Hawks.The charismatic Cary Grant was a true star.He shines in this movie in the air and on the ground.Jean Arthur makes a perfect female lead.And then Rita Hayworth with her sex appeal.Richard Barthelmess is brilliant as the man who's not the most popular person among other fliers.The fantastic Sig Ruman plays Dutchy.This movie contains some exiting flying sequences.It seems pretty amazing what goes on in the air..
The basic premise of the movie is that of a female musician Bonnie Lee (Jean Arthur) who arrives in a South American port and ends up meeting a bunch of pilots headed up by the head of the airline Geoff Carter (Cary Grant) and gets involved with them as they fly their missions through a life threatening mountain pass.
That's what I love about these old movies: you can always tell that the directors spent more time talking with the actors and writers than worrying about the special effects, which is what make the special effects truly special.Many note that this was Howard Hawks' most personal film of his career--he frequently associated with pilots, and he knew the characters inside and out.
The story is weak, but the Howard Hawks-produced aerial climax is nicely done.****** Only Angels Have Wings (5/12/39) Howard Hawks ~ Cary Grant, Jean Arthur, Richard Barthelmess, Rita Hayworth.
With Cary Grant it has a great leading man and with Jean Arthur and Rita Hayworth the movie also has two more than great female actresses.
The cast is excellent; Cary Grant, Jean Arthur, and Thomas Mitchell are at their best, with wonderful support.
Doesn't hurt that a young Rita Hayworth is in here to.High Drama/Adventure along with a nice little love story and lotsa plane crashes make for a good film.
Nevertheless, Jean Arthur begins falling in love with Cary Grant, who runs the flying operation...despite the fact that he repeatedly insults her.Many see this as one of Howard Hawks' best directorial efforts, and perhaps it is, once you accept the rather boneheaded premise.
A group of bush pilots fly through rough weather and mountain passes to deliver the mail and win a contract in Howard Hawks' "Only Angels Have Wings." They're led by the crafty Geoff Carter (Cary Grant), who's attracted the attention of a wandering American woman, Bonnie Lee (Jean Arthur).
Only Angels Have Wings is directed by Howard Hawks, has a screenplay by Jules Furthman and stars Cary Grant, Jean Arthur, Thomas Mitchell, Sig Ruman, Richard Barthelmess and Rita Hayworth.Only Angels Have Wings is a story about a group of emotionally damaged people.There's Geoff(Cary Grant)the tough as nails pilot who is the head of the flying department that delivers the mail and any other things(like medical supplies etc).Bonnie(Jean Arthur)the young American girl looking for love and adventure and who is as tough as Geoff is.The Kid(Thomas Mitchell)Geoff's best friend and fellow pilot who may be growing blind and who's mourning for his brother, who was killed in a plane crash when his co pilot bailed out.Dutchy(Sig Ruman)the hotel and airfield owner where the pilots are based, who is running out of money to keep it running.Cary Grant gives one of his best performances here as the cynical tough guy who can't afford to get sentimental, if he gets sentimental he thinks he'll get weak and that's a risk in the job he does.
Grant proves here and in Notorious how good he was at playing darker characters, it's a shame he didn't get more roles like this.The flying scenes look quite realistic and you get a sense of how dangerous this job is.