Squadron of Doom (1949)
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Simply Perfect
A brilliant film that helped define a genre
what a terribly boring film. I'm sorry but this is absolutely not deserving of best picture and will be forgotten quickly. Entertaining and engaging cinema? No. Nothing performances with flat faces and mistaking silence for subtlety.
Worth seeing just to witness how winsome it is.
SQUADRON OF DOOM is the film version of a 1936 serial called ACE DRUMMOND, about a fighter pilot battling a mysterious evil mastermind in Mongolia. The extremely poor quality of the available print makes this looks much, much older than its years which is little surprise as the serial was already 14 years old when this condensed version was released. It looks like it was made in the 1910s, the quality is that bad.As you can imagine, it's a short, snappy piece of film-making that's often difficult to get into because the locations and situations constantly jump from one thing to another. There's a lot of plane footage, a lot of religious mysticism at a Mongolian temple, and a fair amount of shoot-outs and fisticuffs. John 'Dusty' King is something of a dated hero but fun arises from seeing a couple of familiar faces in the form of Lon Chaney Jr. and Noah Beery Jr. playing henchmen. Apart from a couple of actors, most of the Asian roles are played by whites. Watching something like this, I just wish I was seeing the full version to find out what I'm missing.