The Fighting Pilot (1935)

 

Richard Talmadge, born in 1892, worked as an acrobat as part of the Flying Melzettis before diving into the movie business as a stuntman, often doubling for Douglas Fairbanks or Tom Mix. In later years, he was behind the camera as a stunt coordinator or second-unit director. But for a few years in the 1930s, he was the star of a series of B-movies, produced by the Poverty Road studio "Reliable Pictures." 

One of these films is The Fighting Pilot, which was released in 1935. Talmadge plays Hal Foster, a pilot with acrobatic talents that come in handy when someone tries to steal both the plans and the prototype of a new airplane.

The movie clocks in at 56 minutes, so (like most B-movies) it doesn't waste any time. A villain named Cardigan steals the plans and a couple of pilots he's hired fly off with the plane itself. Foster pursues a carload of bad guys on a motorcylce, eventually jumping into the car and fighting three men while the car careens out of control.

Laster, he trails Cardigan to a building in Chinatown. More acrobatic/fight shenanigans follow. Along the way, he learns where the prototype plan is actually stashed. Flying there, he makes a mid-air leap into a plane full of bad guys.

The story is structured purely to show off Talmadge's acrobatic abilities. This is fine, because he's a great acrobat and his stunts (especially that motorcylce-to-car leap) are fun to watch. 

The supporting cast is also good. Well, mostly good. Rorbert Frazer is appropriately oily as Cardigan. Gertude Messinger plays Foster's gal--she's nice to gaze upon and is pretty darn spunky. The downside is Eddie Davis as Berty, Foster's comedic sidekick. It's here that the movie as the same failing as many other B-movies in that it inserts a sidekick who simply isn't that funny. 

But it's not enough to spoil the film. Richard Talmadge was a great acrobat and stuntman, so a short film built around his stunts is an inherently good idea. This makes watching The Fighting Pilot a pleasant way to pass an hour. 

You can watch it yourself here:

The Mighty Hercules, Part 5

 

cover art by Rube Grossman

Sandwiched between the two Hercules stories in Gold Key's The Mighty Hercules #2 (October 1963) is a comic book adaptation of the Perseus vs. Medusa myth. Written with by Paul S. Newman with his usual skill at quick exposition and sound plot construction, it is drawn by Rube Grossman. 

After I read it, I was surprised when I leafed back through the issue and discovered it was only four pages long. Newman and Grossman pack a lot of story into those few pages without the story being crowded or rushed.

King Polydectes has the hots for Perseus' widowed mother. (A little cleaning up of the original myth goes on here to match Gold Key's family-friendly standards. Perseus, in this version, is explicitly not one of Zeus' many illegitimate kids.)

Perseus' mom declines a proposal and the king doesn't want to just take her because she's protected by Perseus. So Polydetes sends Perseus off on a mission--he has to bring back the head of Medusa the Gorgon.

It seems like a suicide mission, but the gods Athena and Hermes give him a shield, sword and Hermes' super-speed sandals to aid him. For brevity, the story leaves out the cap of invisibility and a few other magic items also given to him in the original myth.

Perseus uses the reflection of Medusa on the back of his shield to approach and behead Medusa, with our view of the beheading hidden by some rocks. 

Perseus heads home. Again, for brevity's sake, this version leaves out events of a longer version of the myth where Perseus saves his future wife Andromeda from a sea monster. Too bad--Grossman's lively art would have made that look cool.

Perseus arrives at home to discover the king has made Perseus' mom a slave. But the hero uses Medusa's head to turn the evil king to stone, then takes his mom home.

That Newman and Grossman were able to condense the story into just four pages and still make it a satisfying read is a remarkable accomplishment. One of the sadder things about this second issue being the last is that we don't get to see anymore adaptations of classic myths by these two.

Next week, we'll finish our journey through the pages of The Mighty Hercules.