Wings (film) - Production

Production

The film, completed with a budget of $2 million, was the first film to win the Academy Award for Best Picture (then called "Best Picture, Production") for the film year 1927/1928, and won a second Academy Award for Engineering Effects. Primary scout aircraft flown in the film were Thomas-Morse MB3s and Curtiss PW-8s.

The film was written by John Monk Saunders (original story), Louis D. Lighton and Hope Loring (screenplay), edited and produced by Lucien Hubbard, directed by William A. Wellman, with an original orchestral score by John Stepan Zamecnik, which was uncredited. The movie was shot at Kelly Field, San Antonio, Texas between September 7, 1926 and April 7, 1927. A sneak preview was shown on May 19, 1927 at the Texas Theater on Houston Street in San Antonio. The premiere was held at the Criterion Theater, in New York City, on August 12, 1927.

The film was one of the first to show two men kissing: a fraternal moment during the deathbed finale, and one of the first widely released films to show nudity. Clara Bow's breasts can be seen for a second during the Paris bedroom scene when army men barge in as she is changing her clothes. In the Enlistment Office, nude men undergoing physical exams, can be seen from behind, through an open door, which is opened and closed. This film was released a few months before the MPPDA list of "Don'ts and Be Carefuls" was established.

Producer Lucien Hubbard hired director Wellman because of his World War I aviator experience. Arlen, Wellman, and John Monk Saunders had all served in World War I as military aviators. Arlen was able to do his own flying in the film and Rogers, a non-pilot, underwent flight training during the course of the production, so that, like Arlen, Rogers could also be filmed in closeup in the air. Lucien Hubbard offered flying lessons to all, and despite the number of aircraft in the air, only two incidents occurred, one involving Dick Grace, a stunt pilot and the other was a fatal crash of a United States Army Air Corps pilot.

The original Paramount release was color tinted and had some sequences in an early widescreen process known as Magnascope, also used in the Paramount film Old Ironsides (1926). The original release also had the aerial scenes use the Handschiegl color process for flames and explosions. Some prints had synchronized sound effects and music, using the General Electric Kinegraphone (later RCA Photophone) sound-on-film process.