With its stirring musical score and Warner Brothers impeccable staccato pacing, China Clipper is an often entertaining tale of the evolution of aeronautics and the creation of the title airplane. The plot concerns Pat O'Brien's efforts to be an aeronautics trailblazer while thoroughly alienating all his supporters. By the end he embraces his humanity while his aviation dream is consummated.
Pat O'Brien gives his standard performance as a ruthless and thoroughly unlikable character while carrying the dramatic weight of the film. Beverly Roberts enacts his long-suffering wife who leaves him early and comes back late; hard to believe she could want him considering the miserable way he treats her. Perhaps most fascinating is Humphrey Bogart in one of his earliest post-Petrified Forest roles as an ace flyer and long-time compatriot of O'Brien. He and Pat share the best scene in the film where Bogart tells him off before socking him on the button to punctuate a temporary kiss off. This film was shot during the brief period where Warner Brothers was trying to figure out what to do with Bogie by casting him in a wide array of roles before shackling him in the gangster genre for the rest of the 30s.
The supporting cast is filled with familiar faces; many of which were just beginning their careers. The most notable is Wayne Morris, who gets a brief closeup before lurking in the out-of-focus background as the China Clipper navigator. Interesting to note he would soon be given the star treatment and eclipse Bogart temporarily while the latter remained stuck in thankless supporting roles for the decade.
As a whole the film wizzes along; covering a lot of ground in typical Warners breakneck fashion while being annoyingly episodic. However the final 25 minutes or so, which involve the epic maiden flight of the China Clipper across the Pacific, is fraught with tension and solid melodrama. Had the bulk of the film involved this rather than a lot of buildup the movie would probably have been better off. As it stands China Clipper deserves a look for the talented cast and swell aerial photography.
Pat O'Brien gives his standard performance as a ruthless and thoroughly unlikable character while carrying the dramatic weight of the film. Beverly Roberts enacts his long-suffering wife who leaves him early and comes back late; hard to believe she could want him considering the miserable way he treats her. Perhaps most fascinating is Humphrey Bogart in one of his earliest post-Petrified Forest roles as an ace flyer and long-time compatriot of O'Brien. He and Pat share the best scene in the film where Bogart tells him off before socking him on the button to punctuate a temporary kiss off. This film was shot during the brief period where Warner Brothers was trying to figure out what to do with Bogie by casting him in a wide array of roles before shackling him in the gangster genre for the rest of the 30s.
The supporting cast is filled with familiar faces; many of which were just beginning their careers. The most notable is Wayne Morris, who gets a brief closeup before lurking in the out-of-focus background as the China Clipper navigator. Interesting to note he would soon be given the star treatment and eclipse Bogart temporarily while the latter remained stuck in thankless supporting roles for the decade.
As a whole the film wizzes along; covering a lot of ground in typical Warners breakneck fashion while being annoyingly episodic. However the final 25 minutes or so, which involve the epic maiden flight of the China Clipper across the Pacific, is fraught with tension and solid melodrama. Had the bulk of the film involved this rather than a lot of buildup the movie would probably have been better off. As it stands China Clipper deserves a look for the talented cast and swell aerial photography.