The pilots are encouraged by others to do “something worthy of [their] name[s],” and, in the movie’s most inspirational moment of dialogue, French Captain Thenault tells the young Americans to “only do what your conscience commands, and your courage allows.” These ideas are noble and help the movie take flight. But the words don’t have time to sink in before the audience-reaction cues begin to grate. An aggressive musical score is one of the chief culprits – for example, strings swell anytime the young pilots see their flying machines.

When one aircraft runs out of gas and crashes, and the injured pilots are tended to by prostitutes, things start to unravel. “This ain’t so bad,” says one of the wounded pilots, while the hurt Rawlings falls for a fresh-faced woman who, he says, is far too pretty to be a prostitute (surprise! she’s not one). A devout fighter says he “keeps his Bible close” and gustily belts out “Onward Christian Soldiers” while blowing the enemy out of the skies.

There are plenty of nifty aerial fight scenes in “Flyboys,” but it all seems strangely perfunctory. The film simply isn’t interested in the Big Picture – what caused WWI or how the war ended. The film’s climax is also its conclusion; there is no denouement.

Although the film is not grievously offensive, it is never more than merely serviceable storytelling. The Lafayette Escadrille is a great war-time story, and it deserves a great film. However, “Flyboys” is not that film. In its desire to reach a broad audience, it intersperses action with romance, settling for clichés in both instances. The bland performances from a mostly undistinguished cast don’t help matters.

Franco has had a terrible year, on the basis of his performance here and in “Annapolis,” as well as a cameo in the doomed, derided remake of the “The Wicker Man.” His square-jawed glower  and James Dean looks can’t disguise a deficit of charisma that leaves “Flyboys” grounded – and which should send his future leading-man prospects into a tailspin.

AUDIENCE: Teens and up

CAUTIONS:

• Language/Profanity:  A few profanities.
• Drugs/Alcohol:  Drinking, including some reluctant imbibing by a teetotaler.
• Sex/Nudity:  Prostitutes care for two wounded pilots.
• Violence:  Fights in the air; a pilot uses a revolver to commit suicide before his plane is engulfed in flames; destruction of several airplanes and a blimp; a shocked pilot is slapped across the face; a recruit confesses to a past crime; a pilot’s pinned hand is hacked off with a shovel; a man falls off his horse.