The first feature length film to win the Oscar for best film (as well as for best special effects), Wings was also the first hit of a young filmmaker who had directed for only three years with eleven films under his belt. The film confirmed William Wellman’s popularity as a successful and dazzling director, even though he argued intensely with Paramount during the editing stage. The company was concerned that the filming had been going on for three months with no end in sight, and the conspicuous two million dollar budget (the largest Paramount budget for the year 1926) had been exceeded. Paramount decided to cut funding, but Wellman continued to work, and even managed to have his contract renewed favorably thanks to his hew agent Myron Selznick. […] The film was produced primarily to showcase its spectacular aerial combat sequences in which Wellman was able to transmit his energy and visual creativity. He was also able to blend his special vision of physical action with his personal experience as a pilot during the war. But perhaps the most remarkable element was his ability to dominate space in order to communicate feelings to his audience in a context – the sky – which by definition has no points of reference or coordinates. Recognition should be given to the associate producer B.P. Schulberg, who insisted Paramount work with Wellman, convinced that the young director would be able to relate seamlessly to the project. Wings is a great example of a director doing his best work, filming something that he knows and understands deeply. Autobiographical references in the film are extremely rare, since Wellman had only contributed marginally to the screenplay by Hope Loring and Louis D. Lighton. The film, however, does refer to the battle of San Michel where one of the director’s best friends, Dave Putnam, lost his life on September 13, 1938. […] Wellman’s reference to the Lafayette squadron breathed life into the characters of young boys who enthusiastically join a war about which they have no knowledge and no understanding of the magnitude, initially. […] Wellman’s experience in the air force gave him the ability to create astounding cinematographic scenes of air battles (at times twenty planes were in the air at once). He was also able to make viewers understand the intricacies behind the aerial fights (attacks, feints, chases, etc.). This also translated into remarkable camera takes with dramatic force, the result of unexpected visual concepts.
(Hubert Niogret, Les Ailes. L’espace du ciel, “Positif”, n. 396, febbraio 1994)