As someone who loves the notion of flight as adventure to the extent of having been in a microlight, hot-air balloon, helicopter, twin-seater single - propeller aircraft, best of all a twin-prop civilian charter flight over the Grand Canyon, and lover of the devil-may-care spirit of 1920's America, this particular movie celebrating a barnstorming "flying-circus" troop was always going to be right down my street, or should that be flight-path... Throw in heavyweight participants hot from "Butch Cassidy..." and "The Sting", like director George Roy Hill, screenplay writer William Goldman ("Butch Cassidy" only) and of course Robert Redford in the lead and you just know this one is going to straighten up and fly left.The film title and introductory scenes where we first see Redford's "Pepper" character are however deceptive. These entertaining almost playful scenes where we witness Pepper's good-natured rivalry with fellow-flier Bo Svennson not only for the patronage of the target awe-struck thrill-seeking populace of little-town Americans but also for, of course "the girl", Susan Sarandon in an early role, have a touch of whimsy, even sentimentality as Pepper takes a hero-worshipping young tyke up for a spin.However the film grows more serious as it continues, as we are made aware that in the end this is a business and that to make money and outdo rival companies for daring, the Barnum-type owner/entrepreneur Dilhoeffer (well played by Philip Bruns) exhorts Pepper and his confederates to ever more dangerous stunts with nary a thought for the consequences (health and safety doesn't get a look in here!). The outcome is predictable as first of all, Sarandon and later Pepper's friend, boffin-type aircraft designer Stiles die horribly in stunts which go disastrously wrong, leading the film to its ultimate and overriding motif about the "otherness" of people like Pepper, gifted with a rare talent but with a bent for living on the edge, outside everyday society.Such people are of course rarely long for this world, as is tacitly underscored at the end where we learn of Pepper's death at a young age from a commemorative picture on a wall but are overall left with a great admiration for all those risk-taking individuals from those times, unforgettable photographic images of whom (you know the ones I mean, wing-walking or even playing tennis on bi-planes, workmen casually eating sandwiches on girders atop the under-construction Empire State Building etc) can still draw gasps of admiration from people like me living our ordinary, mundane earth-bound lives.The cinematography is fantastic, thirty years before "The Aviator", the air stunts are brilliantly pulled off and photographed. Redford is at his winning best as the "out-there" Pepper and he's well supported by his band of high-flying misfits. Part of me was repelled however by the seeming disregard for the deaths of Mary Beth and Stiles by Dilhoeffer, Pepper etc not to mention the rubbernecking general public and believe a little more humanity could have come through in the writing.On the whole though this is a charming, greatly entertaining movie, not without its darker side and for me belongs in the same air-borne formation with "Only Angels Have Wings" and "The Aviator" as a classic movie celebrating the lives of those fascinated by and/or who make their living in the skies above. Mere days after Captain Sullenberger's near miraculous emergency descent into the Hudson river, amen to that!

How can this film barely have more than a single page of comments? Redford in his youthful heyday, following the success of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, Susan Sarandon as the female lead, and yet, apparently, so few have ever seen this that less than two pages covers comments. Major urging: see this film.Extremely well written and directed, even better acting, all stunts by human beings and not computers, and beautifully photographed. The only weakness is that due to audience availability, this film is hard to find on DVD, even at Blockbuster. Similar to The Hill, absolutely the best acting performance by Sean Connery, but try and see it. Major hint to those who have missed Waldo Pepper: never, ever, under any circumstances whatsoever, attempt the double loop, especially in a plane. Today, July 28, 2007, we had two crashes at the Wisconsin and Ohio Air Shows. Death isn't just in the movies when doing stunts in a plane.

. In the 1970's, I was competing in Freestyle Snow Skiing, and the sport was very new, it went through trying times, people were injured permanently and the sport had to regulate itself and stop the barnstorming aspect of itself. I remember being able to do stunts one year, that were illegal the next year. We, the competitors, felt that the sport was being regulated to death. . But the sport survived, and still thrives, people are doing wilder stunts now than back then, so I guess all came out well in the end. I remember going to a Halloween party in a nice sports car, way back then, dressed as the great Waldo pepper, in a flight uniform with scarf, and knowing that my time, at that age, was very similar to his. I related to the movie at that time in other words. . Paul Bannon

I rented the dvd of the movie 'cause I saw the dvd at my local library and my full nickname is waldo frinkazoid. The cover looks pretty good and the name Robert Redford 'rang a bell'. I guess that those reasons were not good enough, To like this movie i think you have to bee an aviation freak. The story is not the main thing in this movie, one should be impressed but the stunts performed in the movie, the story comes in second place. The title makes you believe it's a tribute to Waldo Pepper but I can't say I like what he did much.