Britain's first major filmic propagandistic effort, The Lion Has Wings was completed and rushed on to British screens within a couple of months of the start of the war! (Conceived by Alexander Korda) to inspire confidence in Britain's defenses and quell any thought of panic, two versions were prepared, one with added dramatic scenes with Merle Oberon and other Korda players, and this virtually straight documentary version (put together from newsreel footage and stock material, and) with very little thespic propagandizing, despite the presence of Ralph Richardson, Robert Douglas and others. The Oberon scenes were fun and even rather sweet in their naive way, but as a film this shorter version is probably better. Some of it was quite creative, notably a satiric sequence, compiled from newsreel material, debunking Hitler and the Nazis. William K. Everson