“WINGS OVER NEW ZEALAND”

Dominion, Volume 34, Issue 136, 5 March 1941, Page 5

“WINGS OVER NEW ZEALAND”

Training Of Airmen Filmed

“W’ings over New Zealand,” the

locally-produced film which was shown privately at the King's Theatre, Wellington, yesterday morning, epitomizes strikingly the- fact that New Zealand is eagerly air conscious. At the same time the film, which illustrates the training of our airmen, demonstrates the extent to which New Zealand is playing her part in the raising of those battalions of the air which are to be such a vital factor in the victory that'is coining.

Diversity in location is assured by the inclusion in the picture of scenes on most of the training aerodromes In the Dominion, but actually the_ setting is of minor interest compared with the graphic record given of the work of training airmen in this country. The film shows the process from the very beginning, when the trainees enter the grounds in “civvy” clothes. It gives close-ups of the men at the air-training day and night schools, and the various courses they go through as. observers, pilots, gunners and ground staff. One of the most interesting shots shows trainees at work in the Link trainers, the mobile electric units in which man’s reactions to instructions, given him with the aid of a miscrophone, can be judged. The budding airmen are seen at drill, on their exercises in the air, and finally there is a good picture of the passing-out parade, which, aided by the band of the Royal Air Force, is a most picturesque ceremony. Several Ministers of the Crown, and Sir Harry Batterbee, High Commissioner for the United Kingdom, were among those who witnessed the screening of “Wings Over New Zealand” yesterday morning. All agreed that the picture, which takes 15 minutes to screen, Is a splendid record, of an important branch of New Zealand’s war work, and that it should lie shown throughout the country as evidence of the sterling preliminary training work that is being done in New Zealand.