Excellent, Without a doubt!!

Blistering performances.

The acting in this movie is really good.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

An Anti-War Movie that is Filled with Dread. The Brooding, Sensitive Richard Dix Plays a Pacifist Goaded into Entering WWI with the rest of the Lemmings by His Cute Girlfriend (Elizabeth Allan). Once there He is Propelled into a Flying Killing Machine.He becomes and Ace of Aces as His near Psychotic Exploits are Turned when He is Forced to Confront His Death Talley by an Unarmed Kid He Shoots Down and Nearly Kills. After this He Snaps back to His Senses and All is Well, sort of.This has some Pre-Code Violence (suicide and a bloody face mashing) among its Sexual Take on a Relinquished Virginity brought on by the Uncertainty of War. Some of the Dialog has a Bite and it makes it Clear in its Anti-War Sentiments.Above Average in Theme and Wit, this will most likely Disappoint those Seeking Aerial Dogfights and Rah-Rah Action. But it makes up for it with a Strong, Sombre Stance and an Edgy Screenplay.

Potential SPOILER.OK, so it's not a great movie. For it's time, it was probably considered pretty damn good but some movies, and this is just my humble opinion, just don't hold up over time. Albert Fin....sorry, Richard Dix was a pretty OK actor, as one other reviewer put it, a bit hammy, but over all, for the 30s, not bad but I have to admit, his maniacal killer stuff was the stuff that modern film considers parody. His obsession with the kill (a guy who was very much a pacifist) was maybe a tad overdone. However, from a psychological standpoint, what a very interesting character study. I'd LOVE to see this movie remade with a more gradual change in the character instead of almost immediately, though you can see how getting MAD can change a person's outlook.I'm not sure if that was really a spoiler, but I'll click the box to be on the safe side.Mr. Finney...DAMMNIT, Mr. Dix plays crazy well, I'll give him that, campy, hammy, but well and as I said, almost funny. I fully enjoyed him. I find it sad that almost every war movie made up until the 1960s seemed to find a need for a love story. Blech! This one had one and maybe it was needed to help show his transformation, but, ah, whatever. I enjoyed it and would never tell anyone not to see it. 'Nuff said.

"Ace of Aces" was deliberately acted by Richard Dix while the role of Elizabeth Allen remains unclear. But she did attempt to convey the entire picture of a girlfriend during World War I who sees it as being a true requirement. How many total movies in the 1930s did that? Thus this is a suppressed movie. It's known that the British sent about 300 conscientious objectors to the firing squad during World War I. No one on the allied side in the movie, set of course in a flying squadron base, has any idea what World War I is about. You're not going to find from the movie whether the U.S. entering it helped anything. We know what the ultimate result was. So assuming the movie's value is the precise degree of disparity between Richard Dix and Elizabeth Allen, it is noteworthy that his character, Rocky Thorne, has the same last name as a major freeway exit adjacent to Fort Lewis, Washington. Which is the largest army base in the United States. Suppressed. Federal judge will grant the motion to extend.

I never liked Richard Dix very much. He's just awful in the wonderful film, Cimarron, which earned him an Oscar nomination. Any other film I've seen in him seems to show him off as a hammy, middle-aged actor just going through the paces. But Ace of Aces was a slight surprise. This WW I story about a pacifist artist who joins up and become a bloodthirsty killer under the guise of being a flying "ace" seems like the kind of role he needed. In a way it's similar to the role of Yancy in Cimarron, but minus the "Wahoos" he lets out sporadically in that film. Plus in Cimarron Dix pales in comparison to the great performance turned in by Irene Dunne. In Ace of Aces, Dix is the star. No one else registers very strongly. Elizabeth Allan is the girl friend, Ralph Bellamy the commanding officer, Theodore Newton the best friend, Nella Walker the socialite, and the Stroud twins (Claude and Clarence) play fellow flyers. Not a great film by any means, but a solid story certainly helps. The aerial dogfights are good but not as good as in Hell's Angels. Check it out.