By Deren Kudeki
Gargoyle staff reporter
Posted Thursday, Feb. 15, 2007, The OG, arts

“FLYBOYS” IS A movie about a group of young American pilots during World War I that follows the exploits of a fighter squadron known as the Lafayette Escadrille.

The squadron was part of the French military and was made up of Americans who wanted to fight in the war and learn to fly before the United States had joined the war.

Originally released in theaters Sept. 22, “Flyboys” came out on DVD Jan. 30.

We see a young Texan named Rawlings (James Franco) and a few other new recruits learn to fly airplanes, which for them is a new and exciting experience since the airplane had only recently been invented. Once they have completed their training, the rest of the movie flip-flops between air battles and ground time.

Being a war movie, many of the named characters die, but not before having at least a small story arc revolve around them that acquaint us with the characters. While many characters die, it is not easy to predict who will survive. Despite all the deaths, the movie does not have a depressing overtone.

The battle scenes are very intense with excellent special effects. The battles are unique, featuring technology we don't typically see. The heroes fly the old double-winged propeller planes, while the Germans fly zeppelins and their sinister-looking red-and- black triple-winged planes.

As the movie unfolds, we see a more individualized form of combat develop in the skies, with the heroes forming rivalries with certain German pilots — very different from the mass slaughter going on in the trenches below.

Aside from piloting, Rawlings develops a romantic relationship with a local French girl named Lucienne (Jennifer Decker), which would be your typical situation with the girl afraid to fall in love with the soldier because she's afraid he will die. However, the movie puts an interesting twist on the situation by having Rawlings only speaking English and Lucienne only speaking French.

My one complaint about the movie is that it is sometimes difficult to distinguish between characters in the battle scenes because they are all wearing leather caps and goggles. One way the movie tries to get around that is by giving each character a different distinguishing image on the side of their plane.

For those who want to get their money's worth from a DVD, the $39.98 two-disc collector's edition of “Flyboys” includes the following features:

• Audio commentary by director Tony Bill and producer Dean Devlin
• “Real Heroes: The True Story of the Lafayette Escadrille” featurette
• “Life of a Stunt Pilot” featurette
• “Whiskey and Soda — The Lion Mascots” featurette
• “Taking Flight — The Making of a Flying Sequence”
• “The Real Planes of Flyboys” featurette
• Deleted scenes
• Theatrical trailer
• “Flyboys Squadron” DVD-ROM game

The DVD also comes in $29.99 single-disc widescreen and fullscreen editions.

“Flyboys” is a good war movie with balanced portions of fighting and drama that I would recommend to anyone who is looking for a light war film.

RELATED

— About the DVD: Official site

— About the film: IMDB entry