Flying Blind (1941)

Very well executed

Very disappointing...

Absolutely the worst movie.

There is, somehow, an interesting story here, as well as some good acting. There are also some good scenes

Don't let the attractive poster/DVD cover fool you. This has a lot of action and thrills, but it is lacking in subtlety and realism. Remember the family driving through earthquake exploding southern California in "2012", then the follow up with them flying? The creators of that scene must have seen this B second feature where a diving plane crashes without exploding and takes off, flying through an inferno without catching fire itself. This surrounds evil Nils Asthers' attempts to hijack the passenger plane to Mexico with stolen military devices, instead going down early where the most absurd situations occur. Pine Thomas productions at Paramount missed the plane (or boat) on this often obnoxious saga that utilizes too Mich humor to hide the fact that the story makes no sense. Pilot Richard Arlen and stewardess Jean Parker quit their regular airline jobs to start a transport plane, taking eloping couples to Las Vegas along the way. Not only is nefarious Asther on board but mismatched and especially annoying Grady Sutton and Marie Wilson who add bubble headed comedy to offset Arlen and Parker's supposedly smart rapporteur. I rolled my eyes with each intended laugh, and ultimately just gave up in trying to figure it all out. The remainder of the cast is filled out with has-beens who were lucky enough just to be minor.

*Spoiler/plot- 1941, A young couple open a new airline for weddings and divorces for their clients going out of state and out of the country. An foreign aircraft spy with a stolen engine part wants to use new airline to escape the war time authorities and to sell his stolen secrets to the enemies of the USA during WW2.*Special Stars- Richard Arlen, Jean Parker, Eddie Quillan *Theme- Americans can't be fooled by foreigners.*Trivia/location/goof- Look for Jean Parker, who will play the first Lois Lane in the TV series, Superman and comedian, Eddie Quillan, who was in the Cable & Laughton 'Mutiny on the Bounty".*Emotion- An enjoyable but rather crazy screwball comedy with spies, airlines, and newlyweds. The fast dialog is enjoyable to hear and see spoken by actors with splendid comedy timing. This film is a piece of history for the wartime era.

This is a B-film that not only had a low budget, but craptastic writing, acting and story. All in all, it was hard watching because it was so incredibly dull.The film is like two films spliced together. The first half is about a jerky guy and his girlfriend quitting a small airline to start their own. None of this is interesting in the least and the romance was far from romantic. The second half is such a change of pace that it just seemed bizarre...and stupid. A guy, out of the blue, hijacks the airline's sole airplane and during this hijacking, you are beside yourself with how stupid everyone acted. For example, when the guy pulls out a gun and takes over the plane, one of the crew members attacks him and tries to disarm him. NOT ONE OF THE PASSENGERS does anything!! They just stand their and offer no help at all--even though the one guy is a crazed psycho hijacker!! Later, in an equally inept scene, the plane supposedly crashes...but there is not crash! They just jiggle the camera to simulate the hard landing...on a plane that was standing still!!! Great special effects, huh?! While there's a little more to the movie than this, the very important question to ask yourself is "who cares!?"--none of it is engaging, some of the characters (the ever-annoying Marie Wilson, among others) are stupid and the film is bad---and should be considered a 'C-movie' if there was such a thing! Dull!

Richard Arlen is a happy-go-lucky pilot who, fired from his job, begins his own airline. It's a line between Los Angeles and Las Vegas, mainly for people who want to get married in America's playground. Trips may also be made between Los Angeles and Reno, for those for whom Las Vegas didn't work out.Arlen's stewardess (for that is what they were called) is the pretty Jean Parker. His chief and only mechanic is Eddie Quillan whose wife is due to give birth during this trip.Among the passengers are two newly marrieds, the goofy Scoutmaster Grady Sutton, and his empty-headed but good-natured bride, Marie Wilson. Also aboard are two spies of undetermined origin smuggling a secret, new carburetor out of Los Angeles and into Las Vegas where they plan to place the device on the roulette table, hoping it will be mistaken for a pile of million-dollar plastic chips. Not really. I don't know why they're taking it to Las Vegas. Las Vegas was never known as a hotbed of espionage. Maybe they figure on wining and dining it and, with any luck, wind up spending the night with it in a water bed suite in a fancy hotel.The airplane is also transporting a heavy steel engine block. Arlen is at the controls in mid-air when he learns about the spies. A fight ensues. The engine block breaks loose from its trappings and slides around until it bashes Eddie Quillan against the bulkhead. The airplane crashes on a mountain top. Everybody survives. The stupid scoutmaster tries to light a signal fire but sets off a forest fire instead. The fight continues on the ground. The good guys win. One of the spies is killed and left behind to barbecue. The evildoer-in-charge is packed aboard the airplane. The airplane manages to take off amidst the holocaust. Arlen marries the stewardess. The schedule Quillan had drawn up for the birth of his child is wrong because he'd torn off two pages from his calendar instead of one. (Joke.) Nothing defines "B" status more than this movie. I bought the DVD as part of a "Heroes of War" collection, which included the far more enjoyable "Gung Ho." I had to force myself to sit through it because I'd paid for it. The audio stinks and the images were appropriately in blurry black and white. The score, surprisingly, was by Dmitri Tiomkin. Tiomkin was to go on to more ambitious and better things. He must have been pretty young when he wrote this score, no more than fourteen or fifteen, I'd guess. Tiomkin was a curious guy who had no aspirations beyond doing film scores. It was his perfect métier. He never wanted to sit down and write the great American symphony. Someone asked him what he would like to do if he had his choice of all the professions in the world and he replied, "Write movie scores." The movie isn't dull actually. It doesn't give itself time enough to be dull. It rockets along at a fast clip and if given scenes are dumb or inept or not as funny as they're supposed to be, who's to notice? I know people who would, I think, enjoy this but he lives in a Godforsaken, radioactive place near Trinity Site.