Howard Hughes, James Whale | Hell's Angels (1930)

Hell's Angels could have been a masterpiece. Or at least a 'great flawed film' according to Truffaut's characterization of Marnie. Unfortunately it is neither, for too many indecisive compromises between discordant directions eventually make for a disjointed, self-contradictory work. However, it remains a fascinating thing to watch, and not only because of schadenfreude (since it is a failure of such epic proportions that only true hubris can achieve). It is the clashing of two powerful undercurrents that make it at the same time baffling and fruitful.

Howard Hawks | The Dawn Patrol (1930)

The Dawn Patrol can be placed in several contexts: it is the director's first war movie as well as his first talkie ; besides, it is part of the wave of American aviation films, military or not, that followed Lindbergh's 1927 Atlantic crossing and included Wellman's Wings as well as Hughes & Whale's Hell's Angels. However, contrary to the two aforementioned and to its own original poster baseline, The Dawn Patrol is not an epic. Nor does it fit the usual overtones adopted at the time (and still pretty much today) for most war movies, be it adventure, sacrifice or pacifism.

John Ford | Drums Along the Mohawk (1939)

Oddly enough, Hollywood has produced remarkably few films about the American Revolutionary War, and only a few of them are good - a situation mirrored, on the other side of the Atlantic, by that of French movies about the French Revolution. From a military historian point of view, Drums... is certainly not among the best. It shows a prominent consensual bias - whereas the English and Loyalists are almost non-existent, the Patriots are too good to be true - which certainly disregards the complexity of the situation. However, this bias makes ample room for the depiction of the settlers' life, and thus for the evocation of the effect of war upon people. Therein lies the brillance of this film.