Lafayette Escadrille (1958) on Netflix
Thad Walker, a Boston youth in trouble with the law, flees to France and joins the Foreign Legion. He signs up for the Lafayette Escadrille and falls for Renée Beaulieu, a streetwalker.
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- Netflix2.8/5
- IMDb5.5/101,028 votes
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Trailer
Plot summary
During World War I, Thad Walker leaves Boston after serious trouble with the law and crosses to France to join the French Foreign Legion. In a Paris bar he and his companions Duke Sinclair, Dave Putnam and Tom Hitchcock hear that American volunteers have formed the Lafayette Escadrille to fly for France. The men enlist and train as pilots. Off duty, Walker meets Renée Beaulieu, a streetwalker, and falls in love with her. She gives up the trade and takes a job for his sake. Walker resents authority of every kind, and his father beat him. When a French officer, angered that Walker cannot follow commands in French, strikes him, Walker knocks him to the ground.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Lafayette Escadrille (1958)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- For the leads, director William A. Wellman wanted Paul Newman and Clint Eastwood, but studio head Jack L. Warner refused and substituted teen idol Tab Hunter and David Janssen, moving Eastwood down to a minor role.
SPOILER
In Wellman's first cut, Tab Hunter's character is killed in the air and his lover throws herself off a bridge into the Seine; previews disliked it, so a happy reunion ending was shot in April-May 1957.- Wellman called Lafayette Escadrille a personal project, but the studio denied him the budget he wanted and took casting, the ending and the title out of his hands, renaming his C'est la Guerre over his objections.
- Surviving pilots of the real Lafayette Escadrille disowned the film over their portrayal, and Wellman insisted his producer credit be removed; the production also drew lawsuits against Jack L. Warner and Warner Bros. for their interference.
- Wellman drew on his own war record: on December 3, 1917 he became the first American fighter pilot to join the N.87 escadrille of the Lafayette Flying Corps, scoring three kills and receiving the Croix de Guerre with two palms.
- The film's period aircraft, including mocked-up Nieuport 28 and Thomas-Morse Scout fighters, a real Fokker D.VII and Travelair "Wichita Fokkers", were lifted from Wellman's own 1938 film Men with Wings, while stunt pilot Paul Mantz built Blériot XI "Penguin" trainers for the flying sequences.
- Lafayette Escadrille was shelved for two years, partly because of wrangling between Wellman and Jack L. Warner; TCM cites a modern source saying the delay was also partly due to the studio's hopes that star Tab Hunter would succeed as a singer.
