Now We’re in the Air is a World War I comedy about a pair of fliers who wander onto a battlefield near the front lines and get tangled up with a traveling circus and a spy. Though popular in its time, the film has been sought today as one of four missing films Louise Brooks made in 1927. This twenty-minute section of the film was held in the Czech national archive under the name Rif a Raf (its Czech title). Louise Brooks plays twin sisters—“Griselle” raised German and “Grisette” raised French—who are the love interests of the two goofy fliers. Only Grisette appears in the surviving fragment, in a black tutu. —Thomas Gladysz
Now We’re in the Air was produced by Paramount Famous Lasky Corp. and released 22 October 1927. The original American length was six reels (1,767 meters). This restoration is based on the only known surviving element, an incomplete 35mm tinted nitrate print (552 meters) that includes portions of the original reels 2, 3, and 6. The print has Czech intertitles and is preserved at the Národní Filmový Archiv (National Film Archive) in Prague, Czech Republic. New English intertitles have been created for this restoration. The new titles are based on the original Paramount continuity script which is conserved at the Margaret Herrick Library. These new titles feature the same Paramount logo frame and use a typeface similar to the Czech titles they replace. The color tinting reproduces the original color scheme that is indicated in the script. Intervals of three seconds of black frames indicate the transition between each of the sections. This restoration was completed in May 2017 as a partnership between the Národní Filmový Archiv and the San Francisco Silent Film Festival.
