''Conquest of the Air'' is a 1936

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in te ...

or docudrama on the

history of aviation The history of aviation extends for more than two thousand years, from the earliest forms of aviation such as kites and attempts at tower jumping to supersonic and hypersonic flight by powered, heavier-than-air jets. Kite flying in Chi ...

up to that time. The film features historical footage, and dramatic re-creations, of the developments of

commercial Commercial may refer to: * a dose of advertising conveyed through media (such as - for example - radio or television) ** Radio advertisement ** Television advertisement * (adjective for:) commerce, a system of voluntary exchange of products and s ...

and military aviation; including the early stages of technology developments in design, propulsion, and air navigation aids. The film was a

London Films London Films Productions is a British film and television production company founded in 1932 by Alexander Korda and from 1936 based at Denham Film Studios in Buckinghamshire, near London. The company's productions included ''The Private Life o ...

production, commissioned by the British

Air Ministry The Air Ministry was a department of the Government of the United Kingdom with the responsibility of managing the affairs of the Royal Air Force, that existed from 1918 to 1964. It was under the political authority of the Secretary of State ...

Synopsis

Cast

Frederick Culley Frederick Culley (8 March 1879 – 3 November 1942) was a British film actor. He is best remembered as the kindly Dr. Sutton in '' The Four Feathers'' (1939). His Father, Richard Palethorpe Culley, was an entrepreneur and philanthropist and his ...

as Roger Bacon * Laurence Olivier as Vincent Lunardi *

Franklin Dyall Frank Poole Dyall (3 February 1870– 8 May 1950), professionally known as Franklin Dyall, was an English actor. In his early years he was a member of the companies of the actor-managers George Alexander, Ben Greet, John Martin-Harvey and ...

as Jerome de Ascoli *

Henry Victor Henry Victor (2 October 1892 – 15 March 1945) was an English-born character actor who had his highest profile in the film silent era, he appeared in numerous film roles in Britain, before emigrating to the US in 1939 where he continued ...

as Otto Lilienthal *

Hay Petrie David Hay Petrie (16 July 1895 – 30 July 1948) was a Scottish actor noted for playing eccentric characters, among them Quilp in ''The Old Curiosity Shop'' (1934), the McLaggen in '' The Ghost Goes West'' (1935) and Uncle Pumblechook in ''Great ...

as Tiberius Cavallo * John Turnbull as Ferdinand Von Zeppelin * Charles Lefeaux as Louis Bleriot *

Bryan Powley Bryan Gilbert Powley (16 September 1871 – 18 December 1962) was a British stage and film actor. He began his career in the era of silent film. Life Powley was born on 16 September 1871 in Reading, the son of the Rev. Matthew Powley and Louis ...

as Sir George Cayley *

Alan Wheatley Alan Wheatley (19 April 1907 – 30 August 1991) was an English actor. He was a well known stage actor in the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, appeared in forty films between 1931 and 1965 and was a frequent broadcaster on radio from the 1930s to the ...

as Giovanni Alfonso Borelli *

John Abbott Sir John Joseph Caldwell Abbott (March 12, 1821 – October 30, 1893) was a Canadian lawyer and politician who served as the third prime minister of Canada from 1891 to 1892. He held office as the leader of the Conservative Party. Abbo ...

as Jean-François Pilâtre de Rozier

Production background

The film was initially commissioned by

Alexander Korda Sir Alexander Korda (; born Sándor László Kellner; hu, Korda Sándor; 16 September 1893 – 23 January 1956)navigational equipment Navigation is a field of study that focuses on the process of monitoring and controlling the movement of a craft or vehicle from one place to another.Bowditch, 2003:799. The field of navigation includes four general categories: land navigation, ...

, and the transitions between civil and military developments, including

heavy bomber Heavy bombers are bomber aircraft capable of delivering the largest payload of air-to-ground weaponry (usually bombs) and longest range (takeoff to landing) of their era. Archetypal heavy bombers have therefore usually been among the larges ...

s; fast fighter aircraft; and the advent of

naval aviation Naval aviation is the application of military air power by navies, whether from warships that embark aircraft, or land bases. Naval aviation is typically projected to a position nearer the target by way of an aircraft carrier. Carrier-based ...

( aircraft carrier), plus the initial experiments with vertical rotary flight (

helicopter A helicopter is a type of rotorcraft in which lift and thrust are supplied by horizontally spinning rotors. This allows the helicopter to take off and land vertically, to hover, and to fly forward, backward and laterally. These attributes ...

s). An updated version was released in 1940 and released in the United States on 20 May 1940.

References

External links

* * * British documentary films History of aviation British aviation films 1936 films London Films films Air Ministry 1936 in aviation 1936 in military history 1936 in the United Kingdom Films produced by Alexander Korda British black-and-white films British docudrama films 1936 documentary films 1936 drama films British drama films 1930s British films {{1930s-UK-film-stub

Synopsis

Cast

Production background

See also

References

External links