Aces High

Aces High takes place during the First World War, when the British Royal Flying Corps was losing pilots faster than it could replace them. A young lieutenant, Stephen Croft, arrives at a squadron in France with romantic ideas about aerial combat, eager to join the fight and serve alongside his future brother-in-law, Major John Gresham. What he finds is a unit worn down by constant losses, where experienced men steady their nerves with drink and fear is a daily presence. Squadron commander Captain Sinclair tries to hold his men together, organizing parties to distract them from the death waiting in the sky. The film follows Croft as he learns what combat flying actually demands of the pilots sent up again and again.

Jack Gold directed this British-French production from a screenplay by Howard Barker, with Malcolm McDowell, Christopher Plummer, Simon Ward, Peter Firth, David Wood and John Gielgud leading a credited cast of thirty-six. It was Gold's second feature, following Who? two years earlier, and preceded Little Lord Fauntleroy, The Chain and Escape from Sobibor. Made for about a million dollars, it drew modest audiences: on IMDb it holds 6.6/10 from around 3,500 votes, while on TMDB it sits at 5.9/10 from a much smaller group of 88 voters.