Les Chevaliers du Ciel (Knights of the Sky)

Starkey

Avenging Rooster
Anyone from Europe got a chance to watch this? A review this week from a Brazilian magazine rated it as the movie with the best dogfighting scenes ever.

They also report that it won´t be screened in the U.S... It will be released only on DVD on November. It opens Friday here in Brazil, though, on theaters.

"The flight sequences from the film were all filmed with actual planes and aerial photography, without the use of CGI. In order to capture the high-speed maneuvers, a specially designed camera was attached to a Mirage 2000 aircraft which then tailed the 'star planes' as they flew, for only another Mirage 2000 could actually fly at speeds that matched the planes being filmed"
 
They actually named it "Sky Fighters" in the U.S. I thought movie names translation was lame only in Brazil...
 
Starkey said:
I thought movie names translation was lame only in Brazil...

Norway is the worst, I would think:

"War of the Worlds" was translated to "Klodenes Kamp"(Fight of the Globes).
 
The movie sounds really great.
And Fight of the Globes is really weird, even though it is ALMOST right, ehehe.
 
Sky Fighters is a pretty odd translation... but I guess "Knights of the Sky", the best and most obvious translation was already used by some other movie.

I did see the movie a few months ago. It's pretty lame - the aerial photography is good, but the plot is pretty awful.

(also, the aerial photography is hampered by the fact that it's a movie about Mirages, which are one of the ugliest modern fighter planes)
 
Quarto said:
(also, the aerial photography is hampered by the fact that it's a movie about Mirages, which are one of the ugliest modern fighter planes)

Asking just out of curiosity: which one do you consider the most "beautiful"?
 
Plasteel Skull said:
Asking just out of curiosity: which one do you consider the most "beautiful"?
Hard to say, but I think the top three would include the Su-37, the MiG-29, and the JAS-39 Gripen, though I go back and forth between the MiG-29 and the F-15 (those square intakes are terrible :p).

In any case, the thing all of these planes have in common is that they look like real war machines - rather than like something you throw at a dartboard.
 
Asking just out of curiosity: which one do you consider the most "beautiful"?

Something that doesn't look like a tube with triangles stuck to it.
(and doesn't have a french tricolor slapped on)
 
LeHah said:
Sounds like a description of Flyboys.

http://imdb.com/title/tt0454824/


I was going to mention that in a new thread but figure this is as good a place as any. I wasn't impressed with the full trailer for flyboys but I did see a longer TV spot that featured more aerial combat and did look exciting.

One thought did occur to be though. From what I gather, so far Chris Roberts hasn't been able to get the funding together for hes American Knight film. It was supposed to be a movie about ww1 aerial combat in biplanes in which an american flys with the RAF and falls in love with a french woman. (I once jested that is sounded like Biplane Commander). I don't know if the guys making flyboys saw that idea and made their own. Though I think that now, especially if flyboys is bad, Chris will never film his own version. If its successful, it may free up some funding but even if American Knight were to have be a better film, Unless it takes many years to be made it will be judged in the light of Flyboys. His film looses the novelty of being a WW1 biplane movie.
 
AD said:
One thought did occur to be though. From what I gather, so far Chris Roberts hasn't been able to get the funding together for hes American Knight film. It was supposed to be a movie about ww1 aerial combat in biplanes in which an american flys with the RAF and falls in love with a french woman. (I once jested that is sounded like Biplane Commander). I don't know if the guys making flyboys saw that idea and made their own. Though I think that now, especially if flyboys is bad, Chris will never film his own version. If its successful, it may free up some funding but even if American Knight were to have be a better film, Unless it takes many years to be made it will be judged in the light of Flyboys. His film looses the novelty of being a WW1 biplane movie.

I've seen some trailer of something like that (biplane movie about Americans flying during WWI) on apple.com the other day. It was rather funny, when one of the first scenes with airplane dogfight showed full squadron of bloody red tri-plane Fokkers DR II (or what was the number) -- yet almost everybody knows, that such colour scheme and plane type was used solely by Red Baron. I guess this movie (don't remember the name) is full of Red Barons. ~~~. As always american boys will kick badguys's asses, fall in love with beatiful women and leave in the direction of setting sun...
 
Plasteel Skull said:
I guess this movie (don't remember the name) is full of Red Barons. ~~~.

Hehe, I guess the evil german WW2 super soldiers are getting boring, so they're trying to spice things up with evil german WW1 Red Baron clones.:p
 
when one of the first scenes with airplane dogfight showed full squadron of bloody red tri-plane Fokkers DR II (or what was the number) -- yet almost everybody knows, that such colour scheme and plane type was used solely by Red Baron.

No, Manfred von Richthofen, AKA the Red Baron, was the commander of an entire squadron that bore red markings (Jasta 11). Also many other german pilots flew Fokker Dr. 1 triplanes. Oddly enough, he scored over 52 of his 80 kills in other types of aircraft.
 
TankGunner said:
No, Manfred von Richthofen, AKA the Red Baron, was the commander of an entire squadron that bore red markings (Jasta 11). Also many other german pilots flew Fokker Dr. 1 triplanes. Oddly enough, he scored over 52 of his 80 kills in other types of aircraft.
Yeah, but only one of those planes was all-red - IIRC, Jasta 11 only painted the nose and the wheel hubcaps red.
 
Starkey said:
"The flight sequences from the film were all filmed with actual planes and aerial photography, without the use of CGI. In order to capture the high-speed maneuvers, a specially designed camera was attached to a Mirage 2000 aircraft which then tailed the 'star planes' as they flew, for only another Mirage 2000 could actually fly at speeds that matched the planes being filmed"
I'm sorry. I tried to ignore this, but I just can't. Whoever wrote that little blurb desperately needs to be drowned.
TankGunner said:
Oddly enough, he scored over 52 of his 80 kills in other types of aircraft.
Is it really that odd? The triplane was a pretty late addition to the war.
Quarto said:
Yeah, but only one of those planes was all-red - IIRC, Jasta 11 only painted the nose and the wheel hubcaps red.
I was under the impression that the planes in squadron were all completely painted in bright colors, and not just the nose and wheels.
 
Frosty said:
I'm sorry. I tried to ignore this, but I just can't. Whoever wrote that little blurb desperately needs to be drowned.

That´s a quote from the IMDB trivia on the movie. IMO, they are talking about the fighters of the French Air Force, only.
 
Is it really that odd? The triplane was a pretty late addition to the war

I found it odd. I didn't know he flew so many other types until I researched it. Also didn't know that the triplane was a late design. But you learn something new all the time.

Yeah, but only one of those planes was all-red - IIRC, Jasta 11 only painted the nose and the wheel hubcaps red.

Jasta 11 had red markings, but even Von Richthofen didn't always fly an all red fighter. They were known as the Flying Circus for their paint schemes and that they used tents for hangers and living quarters.
 
Actually Richthoven first commandeered Jasta 11 and then was made leader of JG1 (figher wing) which included several Jastas. JG1 (later named after him) was known as the flying circus as many pilots personalised their planes. Though this was not exclusive to the JG1 Jastas with most Jastas featuring distinct paintjobs on their planes (so pilots were able to spot their comrades and especially the flight leaders).

Jasta 11 iirc were using a red tail for their planes.

BTW the Triplane was used from late 1917 to mid 1918 and was inspired by the Sopwith Triplane of early 1917. Though it wasnt realy a very good plane compared to other designs of the war as it was underpowered and quite slow compared to its competitors though its turnrate made up for that in dogfights. The only time the Germans realy ruled the sky with a particular plane was during early to mid 1917 when they introduced the Albatros DIII which was superior to most Allied planes (and Allied numerical superiority was less severe than in the last year of war). One might also mention the Fokker EIII which was very successful in the early stage of the airwar during early 1916.
 
My entire WW1 air force knowledge comes from that little Dynamix game Red Baron. I should play Wings of Glory.
 
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