User Reviews

I watched this film on BBC TV where it was titled "Around the World by Zeppelin" - and an excellent documentary it indeed is.

Contemporary black and white film of the German airship LZ 127 "Graf Zeppelin" (1928), with her 20 passengers and 40 crew, embark on a 21-day voyage to be the first airship to circumnavigate the globe. From Lakehurst Naval Air Station, near New York, and back, across the Atlantic Ocean, over England and Berlin, over the Soviet Union and Siberia, over the Pacific Ocean to Tokyo and on to Los Angeles and across the middle of the United States.

At around 70 mph it's a sedate journey, except when the weather is bad. It's an adventure and, the only woman on board is Grace, Lady Hay Drummond-Hay, who becomes the first woman to circumnavigate the globe by air. It is her diary and reports that give the narrative, and her love interest the weaves in and out of this story of the history of the airship and aviation.

As well as real live footage of the airship - taken from her and taken of her - interwoven is contemporary footage of the late 1920s to help illustrate the female journalist's words.

A great liner is seen in the opening frames, the three-funnelled 54,282-grt United States Lines "Leviathan" - ironically, formerly the German liner "Vaterland" (1913), briefly the largest liner in the world, but handed over to the US as war reparations in 1919.

Towards the end of the film, the "Graf Zeppelin" passes over Honda Point, off California, where lie the wrecks of seven US Navy four-stack destroyers that were lost, with just 23 sailors lives, on 8 September 1923 in the greatest peacetime disaster for the USN. The ships, part of Destroyer Squadron Eleven, were lost in the Honda Point Disaster owing to navigational errors at night. A photograph, with the ships' names is posted online, but one is identifiable in the film, the USS Woodbury (DD 309 - the number clear still on her bow, as she lies on her port side) and that close to her is USS Fuller. It is a sorry sight. The ships were not salvaged until some years after the disaster.

Shortly before arrived in Los Angeles, off Monterey County, the airship sees and passes directly over the American inter-coastal Luckenbach Lines' two-funnelled steamship "Edward Luckenbach", where passengers are seen playing deck games abaft the after funnel.

There are many other twists and sights to see in this exciting and historic documentary, including various early aircraft but I am not competent to identify them. What happened to the young stowaway, one wonders - did he become the film star he wanted to be?

I watched this semi-documentary on BBC television, under the title "Around the World by Zeppelin."

The movie certainly casts a spell, using vintage footage not just to chart the circumnavigation flight of the Graf Zeppelin, but to transport the viewer back to the world of 1929...the way people dressed, the politics that were on everyone's minds, and the status of women. (Of all the journalists and others on the flight, there is only one woman, who is there to report "the woman's point of view" for the Hearst chain of newspapers.)

However, viewers should be aware that some parts of the semi-documentary are fictitious. The airship's tail fin did not rip during the round-the-world flight, but during a previous transatlantic flight in October 1928, and the ship did not have to land on water to do repairs. Also, the shots of German soldiers wearing Nazi armbands are probably anachronistic (from a later date than 1929). So the filmmakers have taken a few liberties to cast their spell.

"That was different," Henry said. They we lounging in the front seats, as usual. He ruffled his short dark hair, longer on the top and short on the sides. Then Kristl handed him a bottle. He glanced at it. Weltenburger Barock Dunkel, an European beer of some kind. Sounded German. The beer was something Kristl had brought with her. He had looked at it with a certain wariness. She liked to buy these heavy beers that knocked you out flat after you had taken two. All fun, unless you had a date with Jennifer. He didn't want to mess up that one.

Kristl waved any remarks away before he could had a chance to say anything, "Only four point seven percent. Enjoy."

"I thought it would be a movie, but it's more like a story read out aloud illustrated with footage from the area," Henry continued.

"I found it interesting nonetheless. It is strangely catchy, even though there isn't any acting. A love story during a voyage around the world in a zeppelin. And with the footage from 1929 it was interesting to look at. It created a mood from the time.

"And there was even some excitement and anxiety, for instance when they traveled over the soviet-union or were blown off course when they crossed the pacific.. "

"I just wonder if we had looked at it if we had known. It wasn't actually a movie, but more a documentary brought in the form of a related story. I think we would have skipped it, wouldn't you think."

"Uhmm well, I did not check if it was a movie. The cover intrigued me, you know. The era is fascinating with flappers, jazz music, experimental cinema, Bauhaus, prohibition, zeppelin and such. And perhaps also because shortly after the wall street crash would occur and the economy would take a nose dive. Then Hitler would gain power and the world would become a lot more grim."

"In this case it was okay. I liked the story and the narrator has fitting voice. I could belief she was that female reporter, alone in a zeppelin full of men." "

"Somehow you make it sound like.."

"I didn't mean to make it sound like a cheap you-know-what movie."

"Heh… Nevermind about that. I am happy though that you liked this non- violent story. Did you realize there was no violence in it at all?"

"A love story..Yes.. no fighting. No violence. Strange.."

"You could even label this movie with: absolutely nobody got hurt in this movie," Kris paused and looked at Henry, "What do you mean: strange?"

"Usually I like a bit of action and action usually implies...violence or the promise of violence."

"Maybe you are changing?"

Henry thought about that in the silence in which he finished his beer. Kristl was about to hand him another one, but he shook his head.

"Even more changes?"

"Not at all. I got a date with Jennifer. A dinner date. I like to have my wits about me. "

"A date? Before you know it you have settled, a mortgage and a score of kids."

"Who knows," Henry said.

"Good luck then.. dad."

Henry looked at Kristl taking a sip from her second beer.

"I could save you one for later," Kristl said.

"It wouldn't mind that."

"Done.. now off you go. Your destiny awaits."

And Henry exited the garage-turned-movie theater leaving Kristl behind with three bottles of Weltenburger Barock Dunkel.

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