HELL'S ANGELS

Original newsreel of the premiere of Howard Hughes' "Hell's Angels" at the famous Grauman's Chinese Theater in Hollywood May 27, 1930. The newsreel was shot in and around the Chinese and features many of the movie's stars, including James Hall, Jean Harlow (1:33) and Ben Lyon. Bebe Daniels (:35), Loretta Young (1:01), Cecil B. DeMille (1:23), Roscoe Turner and his lion Gilmore (1:35), Ruth Roland (1:44), Gloria Swanson (1:53), Dolores del Rio (2:15), Jackie Coogan (2:28), Hoot Gibson (2:46), and Joe E. Brown are also visible in the footage. Hell's Angels is a 1930 American pre-Code independent epic war film directed and produced by Howard Hughes, with James Whale directing the dialogue. Written by Harry Behn and Howard Estabrook and starring Ben Lyon, James Hall and Jean Harlow, it was released through United Artists. The film was originally shot as a silent film, but Hughes retooled it over a three-year (1927–1930) gestation; most of the footage is black-and-white but there are several one-color-tinted scenes chosen for dramatic effect, such as a nighttime gun duel, as well as part-screen full-color for the flames consuming an Imperial German Zeppelin and full-screen full-color for one sequence: the only color footage of Harlow's career. Although not shown in this short newsreel, all the stars and makers of the film attended this premiere event, as well as Buster Keaton, Loretta Young and Grant Withers, Norma Talmadge, Mary Pickford and Douglas Fairbanks, Billie Dove, Joel McCrea, Charles Farrell, Ruth Roland and Ben Bard, Mary Brian, Sally Eilers, Lawrence Tibbett, Sally Blane, Wheeler and Woolsey, Joseph Schildkraut, and Charlie Chaplin with his girlfriend Georgia Hale. A program with leather cover was designed for the premiere by famed aviation illustrator Clayton Knight. Reviews were universal in acclaim for the flying scenes but the mundane plot and maudlin characterizations were also noted.