I suspect that Test Pilot was nominated for Best Picture of 1938 on the strength of its spectacular flying sequences. The film features Clark Gable, Myrna Loy, and Spencer Tracy, all of them good, but what I paid particular attention to was the way that director Victor Fleming (one year away from helming Gone With the Wind) handles the footage of the planes. The planes themselves get closeups, and we’re treated to a lot of spinning propellors and gleaming metal surfaces. For a story about men who are trying out new, experimental planes, Test Pilot also never disappoints with its depictions of the dangers inherent in the title job.
Gable plays Jim Lane, a pilot for an airline run by Howard B. Drake (the ubiquitous Lionel Barrymore). Lane is a womanizer and a hard drinker who seldom gets enough sleep to make him truly ready to fly. That's where Tracy's Gunner Morris comes in. He's Jim's best friend and the only one who can seem to get him in the air and back down on the ground safely. It probably has a lot to do with the gum Gunner sticks on the plane before each flight; at least, that's what we as an audience are meant to believe. It’s an unexpectedly sweet move on the part of someone involved in such a typically macho pursuit.
While trying to set a speed record flying cross country, Jim encounters a thunderstorm. After the new plane starts leaking oil, he dumps all of the gasoline so it won't explode and lands in a field in Kansas. And who should happen to be in that field but the lovely Myrna Loy, playing a farm girl named Ann Barton. While Jim waits for Gunner to arrive and then finish repairs to the plane, he and Ann go to a baseball game and take in a movie. In short, they fall in love. Ann already has a boyfriend, Joe (Ted Pearson), but when Clark Gable asks you to fly away with him, you go. Even though he had already left for New York, once Jim sees the baseball field where they saw the game together, he turns the plane around and takes her to Indianapolis to be married.
Of course, test pilots would naturally make less-than-desirable husbands, given their propensity for dangerous behavior, and the owners of the airlines probably prefer single men to be test pilots since they have fewer reasons to play it safe in the air. So when Jim says he’s taking a week off for a honeymoon, Drake fires him instead. Jim and Ann (with Gunner tagging along too) now have to find a place of their own and another job for Jim to make money. He begins working for a rival of Drake's, even defeating Drake's new flyer, Benson (Louis Jean Heydt), in an air race that ends with a fatal crash. The sequence involving the crash also includes Jim flying a plane that catches on fire soon after take-off. The special effects were state-of-the-art stuff for 1938, and they're still pretty thrilling to watch even today.
Both Jim and Ann start to ponder the possibility of a crash ending his life, and each reacts in a different way. After giving half of the prize money to Benson's widow, Jim goes on a four-day bender, winding up in a Chicago hotel. Ann makes plans to leave Jim. He decides that he needs money to show Ann that he can support her and be a good husband, so he takes on every dangerous mission available. Perhaps they hadn't yet invented irony in 1938. He even tries to fly higher than any plane has flown before in a new military plane that will be carrying bombs.
It's the sequence involving the experiments with that new military plane that provide some of the most thrilling moments of Test Pilot. Tracy's Gunner forgets to put his gum on the plane the way he always does for luck, so you immediately know what's going to happen. He accompanies Jim on the flight, which involves carrying enough weight to simulate the size of the bomb the plane is designed to carry. As Jim keeps pushing the plane to reach 30,000 feet, the sand bags break loose and trap Gunner. The plane crashes into a forest, killing Gunner and leaving Jim to be the one to tell Ann that someone is dead from a plane crash, a task Gunner always feared he would have. It's a nerve-wracking, thrilling, emotional sequence to watch, and it's the highlight of the film.
Interestingly, the film starts with two disclaimers. The first is about the safety of air travel, no doubt an attempt to keep the airline industry from losing business when people see that planes can and do crash and that people sometimes die when planes crash: “Any hazards [the film] presents bear no relation to the safety of modern air transportation.” Sure. The other is about the military and the need to keep secret its operations and developments of new technology: “the technical data used [in the film] in no way represent the performance of any actual aircraft, either military or civil.” Again, sure. I doubt either warning was necessary although I can imagine that, given the powerful imagery of the film, some people might have thought they were watching a documentary.
Gable and Tracy are their usual reliable selves here. Both men were natural actors, and they work well together here. You can sense that their characters’ friendship is real (more on that in a bit), and they seem to have a good time in the scenes where they bicker. The gem among the actors in this movie, though, is Loy. She could be humorous, quick-witted, teary-eyed, sharp-tongued—you name it. Here she has what could be a thankless job, diverting attention away from the macho story involving the dangerous work of men in the air, but she always manages to make herself intriguing. Aside from the sequences involving the planes, the most interesting element of Test Pilot is Loy's performance.
When you watch some of these older films, you can’t help but notice that sometimes the tension isn’t always between just a male and female character. Consider that Tracy’s Gunner is the most consistent person in Jim Lane’s life, and he’s always trying to get Gable’s Jim to leave women alone. He even seems jealous when Jim marries Ann. Oh, I know some will say that’s just because Gunner wants Jim to keep making money so that Gunner can get his share, and he fears that marriage will “tame” Jim to where he won’t desire to keep flying. How then does a viewer explain that Gunner is just as tense as Ann when Jim flies. He’s just as worried about what might happen in a crash. Remember that the two men shared an apartment, and Jim even ensures that Gunner has a room in his new home with Ann. The bickering between Gunner and Jim is almost as pointed and racy as the bantering between Ann and Jim, and should I remind you that Gunner blows Jim a kiss more than once before takeoff? This usually occurs after one or the other of them has used “darling” or “honey” as a term of endearment. Even the camera seems to support this interpretation. At one point, while Loy’s Ann is driving, Gable’s Jim sits next to her in the front seat. Meanwhile, in the middle of the back seat, literally between them on the screen, sits Tracy’s Gunner. Remember, too, that it’s Gunner’s death after a crash that causes Jim to give up flying, not Ann’s consistent worrying about his safety. Yes, I’m fully aware that others will watch this film without noting any of the homoerotic moments I’ve discussed, but something seems to have been going on a lot in those older films after the implementation of the Production Code.
Oscar Nominations: Outstanding Production, Best Original Story, and Best Film Editing
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