Triple Cross (1966)

Director:  Terence Young

Writers:  Rene Hardy, Frank Owen, William Marchant

Composer:  Georges Garvarentz

Starring:  Christopher Plummer, Romy Schneider, Trevor Howard, Gert Frobe, Claudine Auger, Yul Brynner, Anthony Dawson

More info:  IMDb

Tagline:  MASTER-CRIMINAL! SUPER-SPY! AND ALL TRUE!

Plot:  During WW2, convicted bank robber Eddie Chapman becomes a triple agent working for both the British and the Germans.

My rating:   6/10

Will I watch it again?   No.

SPY SPOILERS AHEAD!  YARRRRRR!!!

I like the cast even though some of them don't sustain the level of quality they generally maintain in this picture.  For example, Brynner is does a fine job, playing his usual stern self until the end when it's time for his overly dramatic exit.  It's all too easy for him to over do it.  The rest of the cast does a fine job.  But when it comes to Plummer in the lead, he's mostly great except he sometimes comes off as a super cocky narcissist which makes him difficult to like, and he's the lead so you're kind of supposed to get behind this guy.  Plummer seems quite good at accents.  At times he sounds like a young Errol Flynn which only got me wanting to turn this off and watch a good ole Flynn adventure.  

 

As the title suggests, there's some double and triple cross action going on.  We spend more time with the Germans than with the Britich and most of the Germans aren't all that bad.  They don't display any of the evil side that we know about.  All that means is these Germans have personalities and they're not saying or doing evil things.  Maybe that's on purpose to give the audience room to suggest that maybe Chapman (Plummer) could genuinely be working for the Germans.  It really doesn't matter where his loyalties lie (except really you know he only seems to care about himself and which way the wind is blowing - he doesn't want to get stuck playing on the losing side no matter what).  

 

 Look at how shoddy this shot is?  I promise you they had a budget but they didn't always use it.

The plot moves at a nice enough pace but only once do you get a sense that he's in danger and that's on his first 'mission' for the Germans which ends up being a test that he barely catches onto in time to save his ass.  And that's part of the problem.  Aside from that tension-filled moment, there's little to no suspense.  It doesn't feel like it matters who's side he's really on.  You hope that he's really helping England more than Germany but you don't know until the end.  And by then I almost didn't care.  Speaking of not caring, what about that song playing over the end credits?  That's really out of left field.  It's more appropriate at the end of a Bond spoof.  With this being directed by Terence Young, the director behind 3 of the first 4 Bond pictures, that sounds about right but it's still beneath him.  But this isn't a spy spoof, it's based on a real guy that did these things.  There are enough ingredients in this picture that should've yielded something better and darker.  They had the opportunity to make a strong thriller taken from true events but instead they made a passable WWII spy drama that casually entertains and doesn't try too hard to not be forgettable.  

Sergeant Ryker (1968)

Director:  Buzz Kulik

Writers: Seeleg Lester, William D. Gordon

Composer:  John Williams

Starring:  Lee Marvin, Bradfor Dillman, Peter Graves, Vera Miles, Lloyd Nolan, Murray Hamilton, Norman Fell, Walter Brooke, Francis De Sales, Don Marshall, Charles Aidman

More info:  IMDb

Tagline:  COMMIE MAJOR...or U.S. SERGEANT? There's a bullet at one end...and a hangman's noose at the other!

Plot:  During the Korean War Sergeant Paul Ryker is accused of defecting to Communist China and then returning to his unit as a spy. He's court-martialed and sentenced to death but his attorney believes Ryker's innocent and asks for a new trial.

My rating:   8/10

Will I watch it again?   Yes.

I've never seen a Lee Marvin performance I didn't like and this is no exception.  He owns it and I don't think I've ever seen him play so humble and defeated as he does here.  Sure, he gets lots of time to shine where his anger bursts out like a rabid dog but he's also shines as a softer man who's facing the hangman's noose for treason.  

 

Original airing on KRAFT SUSPENSE THEATRE in 1963, the two-episode broadcast was later combined and released as a film in 1968 after Marvin's massive success the previous year with THE DIRTY DOZEN (1967), the role that made him an overnight worldwide superstar.  Why not, right?  He'd been a solid character actor in films for 18 years.  Anyway, he gives the solid performance you've come to expect from him.  The rest of the cast does a fine job as well.  It's neat seeing some familiar faces like Vera Miles and Peter Graves.  Norman Fell and Murray Hamilton are pitch-perfect in their roles.  Hamilton plays a brash, slimy Army Captain that gets slimier as the film progresses.  Not enough can be said about the great Lloyd Nolan.  The more I see of him, the more I love this guy.  He's such a natural at this and he makes it look as easy as breathing, as if he IS that character.  When he pops up at the end with what he's there to do, I teared-up a bit with happiness.  I'd say half the movie is courtroom drama with the other half dealing with the events that led up to the trial with some breaks between court scenes.  The story gets better and better as it unfolds and I wasn't sure how it was going to play out.  It's a very good movie and worth a watch unless you hate courtroom dramas.  It's in the public domain and free to watch online.

 

 

 

Sailor of the King (1953)

Director:  Roy Boulting

Writers:  C.S. Forester, Valentine Davies

Composer:  Clifton Parker

Starring:  Jeffrey Hunter, Michael Rennie, Wendy Hiller, Bernard Lee, Peter van Eyck, Victor Maddern, John Horsley, Patrick Barr, Robin Bailey

More info:  IMDb

Tagline:  The greatest story of the sea by today's greatest storyteller!

Plot:  In 1940, Canadian sailor Andrew Brown is prisoner on a battle damaged German raider and he plans to delay the raider's at-sea repairs until a British naval task-force can destroy it.

My rating:   7.5/10

Will I watch it again?   YES!

SNIPIN' SPOILERS AHEAD!!!  YARRRRRRR!!!

The film starts out during WWI with a sappy romance when a soldier (Rennie as Richard Saville) meets a girl (Hiller as Lucinda Bentley) before going abroad with the two falling in love in the hours/days before his departure.  They speak of marriage but it never happens.  Did they do the nasty?  It's possible but not all that hinted at.  This happens in the first fifteen minutes and it's pretty by the numbers lovey-dovey stuff of its time.  Cut to more than twenty years later and Saville is an admiral commanding a fleet in WWII.  This is where the film kicks into gear and gets interesting.  Saville is hell-bent on sinking a German warship, the Essen, and he makes the call for one of his ships to hold their position until the fleet arrives.  That ship is destroyed, leaving only two survivors that end up as prisoners on the Essen in sick bay, Earnshaw (Maddern) and Brown (Hunter).  The Essen is damaged and seeks shelter in a small cove, hidden from the sea and Brown gets the crazy idea to steal a rifle and an inflatable boat and secure himself on the cliff overlooking the Essen, shooting those who attempt at repairing the ship in an effort to delay them long enough for the rest of the fleet to find them.  THIS is pretty damn intense and makes for one hell of a show!  

The first, short, act is by the numbers romantic BS.  Get past that and you've got yourself a pretty damn good action thriller.  The performances are very good, especially from Hunter (who goes shirtless and hunky from the time he ditches the German vessel).  

 

 

The direction during the standoff is tight and tense.  This is some really good shit and well worth a watch.  It is weird, though, with the first act feeling tacked on considering the rest of the movie ALMOST has nothing to do with it.  The ending is upbeat and only slightly hints at something possibly relating to Hiller as it's said by Brown that he has a mother and Hiller was in the beginning of the film which are the only two time a woman is either shown or spoken of.  Are we supposed to draw the conclusion that Brown is Saville's son?  Yeah, I think so.  It's really driven home (and emotionally so) when you watch the alternate ending found on the DVD which changes Brown's fate.  Yeah, I choked up a bit.  The alternate ending at least ties her to the story in such a way that more so justifies the first fifteen minutes.  Without it, you're left scratching your head a little bit wondering what the point was except either it was bad writing, filler or studio intervention.  All of those things are still possible but it makes more sense that there's a bigger, more intimate story here.  Regardless, the action/standoff portion is well-handled and worth watching.   Drop the opening BS and this is easily an 8/10.

 

 

The Raid (1954)

Director:  Hugo Fregonese

Writers:  Sydney Boehm, Francis M. Cockrell, Herbert Ravenel Sass

Composer:  Roy Webb

Starring:  Van Heflin, Anne Bancroft, Richard Boone, Lee Marvin, Tommy Rettig, Peter Graves, Douglas Spencer, Paul Cavanagh, Will Wright, James Best, John Dierkes, Helen Ford, Claude Akins, Dolores Fuller, William Schallert

More info:  IMDb

Tagline:  The suspense thriller of the year!

Plot:  A group of confederate prisoners escape to Canada and plan to rob the banks and set fire to the small town of Saint Albans in Vermont. To get the lie of the land, their leader spends a few days in the town and finds he is getting drawn into its life and especially into that of an attractive widow and her son.

My rating: 6.5/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

I know nothing of the true account this story depicts.  I'm sure the fact that the raid happened and that it was Confederate soldiers who executed is correct but I would assume everything else is bullshit to create an interesting story.  With that in mind, I'm sure Major Benton's (Heflin) burgeoning love affair with Katy (Bancroft) is a complete fabrication.  And because of the Hollywood tropes of what becomes of these types of relationships at the ends of movies, I expected more of the same.  I was shocked at the ending and I did not see that coming.  The who's who of character actors makes this more fun for nerds like me.  It's a good little picture that has a little action (only at the beginning and at the end) and only hints at a romance (thankfully, they don't get bogged down into that).  The rest is the preparation for the big finale and the finale isn't all that exciting except for that certain thing that happens (or doesn't happen).  You can watch the flick on YouTube above.

Tank Force (1958)

Original title:  No Time To Die

Director:  Terence Young

Writers:  Richard Maibaum, Terence Young, Merle Miller, Ronald Kemp

Composer:  Kenneth V. Jones

Starring:  Victor Mature, Leo Genn, Anthony Newley, Bonar Colleano, Luciana Paluzzi, Sean Kelly, Kenneth Fortescue, Anne Aubrey, George Coulouris

More info:  IMDb

Tagline:  When iron men in iron monsters fought for a continent!

Plot:  During WW2 in North Africa, an American sergeant serving with the British 8th Army is captured by the Germans but he hatches various plans of escape from the POW camp.

My rating: 5.5/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

Here's another hot-headed American surrounded by an international cast and he saves the day.  It's been a stupid movie trope probably since just before WWII.  Usually the only way it doesn't call attention to itself is when the movie is good.  This one isn't good nor bad, it's just kind of there.  There's nothing all that interesting or exciting in the action,  drama or suspense.  Thatcher (Mature) and friends get caught after a tank battle in the desert with the Germans and are then thrown into a POW camp.  At that point the only thing I could think about is how much more terrible it must have been.  It's already bad enough to be in a POW camp, but to be in the hot desert to boot.  No thanks.  Thatcher's isn't going to stick around (he's got a good reason to get away from the Nazis, more than the usual reason of just not wanting to be around them to begin with) so he busts out on day 2 along with some fellow prisoners.  From this point on it's simply a matter of survival as they hide out in a cantina for a few hours before having to fight their way out, more desert trekking, being hunted down by the Nazi-bribed local Arab tribe, escaping their encampment, more desert trekking and finally one last tank battle before being saved at the last minute by a British tank brigade (or whatever you call it).  There are enough different scenes and obstacles for the cast that it's about the only thing that keeps this from being duller.  It's an OK movie at best. 

Victor Mature does a fine job but he feels out of place in the role.  Over the past twenty years I've seen a few of his movies from the 50s and 60s and every time he looks like his face is heavily caked on with makeup.  I don't know what the deal is with that but it was easily noticeable here, too.  Maybe it's more obvious in this one because of the heat.  In this one he's also a lot heavier than you'd think someone at war in the desert would be.  Just sayin'.

This flick has a lot of future Bond alumni like director Young, writer Maibaum, producer Broccoli, actor Robert Reitty,  and stuntman Bob Simmons.  And as a neat coincidence (or is it?), the latest Bond picture is called NO TIME TO DIE, the original British title of this film.

Flat Top (1952)

Director: Lesley Selander

Writer: Steve Fisher

Composer: Marlin Skiles

Starring: Sterling Hayden, Richard Carlson, William Phipps, John Bromfield, Keith Larsen, William Schallert, Todd Karns, Phyllis Coates, Dave Willock, Walter Coy

More info: IDMb

Tagline: Bombshell story of the Navy's Hell-Divers ... scorching the Pacific skies!

Plot:  During the Korean War, aboard the U.S.S. Princeton, Navy Commander Dan Collier reminisces about his first assignment on the same aircraft carrier in the war against Japan.

My rating:  6.5/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

If there's one character type Sterling Hayden excelled at it was the hard-nosed, no nonsense, gettin' shit done kind of guy and that's exactly who he is here.  He's the leader of these flyboys, he's got the 3rd most confirmed kills in the Navy and he expects nothing but the best from his boys even though they find him to be an uncaring S.O.B..  It's that kind of picture.  Fortunately for the audience they get lots of chances to take down the enemy at sea and on a coastal base and I do mean lots.  Usually movies like this give you a couple of action scenes in the air and that's it but not this one.  Once the fighting starts it keeps going every few minutes.  That's a huge plus in addition to seeing Sterling Hayden gnaw on some dialogue.  The color areal combat photography is great, too.  As you'd expect, all of the shots of the pilots flying (from inside and outside of the cockpits) is cheesily done but what are you going to do?  If anyone can point me to some examples of the era when it was done well, please let me know.   I don't know how else it could've been done back then but there must have been a way to cut down on the phony-ness of it.  It's poorly done in this film.  The uncredited list of actors on IMDb lists James Best and Alvy Moore in this but I didn't see them.

Hannibal Brooks (1969)

Director: Michael Winner

Writers: Michael Winner, Tom Wright, Dick Clement, Ian La Frenais

Composer: Francis Lai

Starring: Oliver Reed, Michael J. Pollard, Wolfgang Preiss, John Alderton, Helmuth Lohner, Peter Carsten, Karin Baal, Ralf Wolter, Jurgen Draeger, Maria Brockerhoff, Til Kiwe, Ernst Fritz Furbringer, Erik Jelde, James Donald

More info: IMDb

Tagline: Supersoldier in the Super Adventure

Plot: A prisoner of war working at a zoo gets the chance to escape from the Germans, so he does and he takes with him the elephant that he's been caring for. Together they head for the Swiss border and freedom.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

I've been wanting to see this for more than thirty years since I saw it sitting on the shelf at the video store.  I also had the soundtrack LP for two decades in which the cover is total bullshit with only Pollard's face on the cover.  Well, now I've seen it.  It's a weird flick.  It feels like it wants to be a comedy but it's only mildly amusing at best.  There are no jokes, per se, just the occasional character laughing and smiling.  That hardly makes it a comedy.  You could make the case that it's a family film except for the abundance of killing and that the world is at war with the Germans and our 'hero' is behind enemy lines trying to get to safety.  Pollard is horribly miscast.  His goofy grin doesn't belong in this film.  His line deliveries and behavior is off enough to where you'd think he was high on weed the whole time.  I normally dig the guy but he had no place in this film in that role.  The Austrian location shooting is GORGEOUS and it's worth watching just for the mountains and the countryside.  Lai's music is lighthearted and family friendly but, like the 'humor' in the film, it's sometimes at odds with what's on the screen.  The story itself is pretty ridiculous.  How possible is it for someone to take an elephant behind enemy lines like this and have any hope of making it to Switzerland?  I'd say none at all.  I'll hate myself in the morning for saying this but that's the elephant in the room.  You'll have to suspend your disbelief a lot for this picture.  I'm surprised there were enough people of influence that thought this was a movie that should or needed to be made.

Heartbreak Ridge (1986)

Director: Clint Eastwood

Writers: James Carabatsos, Dennis Hackin, Joseph Stinson

Composer: Lennie Niehaus

Starring: Clint Eastwood, Marsha Mason, Everett McGill, Moses Gunn, Eileen Heckart, Bo Svenson, Boyd Gaines, Mario Van Peebles, Peter Jason

More info: IMDb

Tagline: ...the scars run deep.

Plot: A hard-nosed, hard-living Marine gunnery sergeant clashes with his superiors and his ex-wife as he takes command of a spoiled recon platoon with a bad attitude.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

Clint is great and grizzled as always.  He's one cantankerous S.O.B. and that's why you love him.  He behaves like I felt watching this movie.  It's frustrating.  On one hand he's fun to watch and you totally understand where he's coming from (most of the time) but on the other, you've got these over the top bozos he commands.  How in the hell would the Marines allow their shenanigans to begin with?  Sure, they're whipped into shape by the end of the movie but for the rest of it they're childish assholes.  Until they got their shit together it felt like they were in some frat house comedy.  I didn't like them and it brought the movie down, especially the annoying Mario Van Peebles (and the rest aren't far behind).  Now, when Clint gets knocked down near the end and he's lying on the back in the rain and you can barely hear him say, "Shit!"?  Classic.  I remember liking this quite a bit thirty years ago in my teens but not so much no.  Shit!

Colditz (1972) TV series

Composer: Robert Farnon

Starring: David McCallum, Richard Heffer, Paul Chapman, Jack Hedley, Bernard Hepton, Hans Meyer, Christopher Neame, Robert Wagner, Edward Hardwicke, Anthony Valentine

More info: IMDb

Plot: This grim and claustrophobic drama chronicles the lives of the prisoners in Colditz Castle from the arrival of the first British prisoners after Dunkirk until the liberation of the castle by the Americans in 1945. Colditz was a "special" camp, designed by the Nazis to hold high-risk and politically important prisoners. Many of the series' plots are based on real events.

My rating: 9/10

Will I watch it again?  Yes.

Outstanding!  The first three or so episodes deal mostly with a few future residents in their escapes that led to their being sent to Colditz castle.  Once these introductions are dispensed with the rest of the episodes are nearly all spent at the prison camp.  Those first few episodes run rather slow but once most of the time was spent at the castle and hanging around these guys full time I liked it more and more.  It gets better as it goes and the second half was much more engaging and it's in some of these episodes you will find the best of the entire run.  Some of them had me quite emotional toward the end.  I'm fresh off of binging the show (being sick allows you to do nothing all day and feel good about it) and I can't say enough about it.  It's a show that takes the subject seriously and doesn't spoon feed the sugar.  Actions have consequences and people have to deal with them.

One thing I learned was that the POW camps were under the jurisdiction of the Luftwaffe and not the SS or Gestapo.  I'm sure I knew this at one point but had simply forgotten about it.  The Kommandant for most of the series (played by Hepton) is an honorable man.  Most of the Germans in the show are portrayed this way.  They're good men doing their duty, abiding by the law and the rules of the Geneva Convention.  The prisoners are treated fairly and with dignity.  I like the respect both sides had for each other.  It's when Major Mohn (Valentine) shows up as second in command when we have a villain to boo and hiss at.  He's a Nazi that couldn't care less about the Geneva Convention and does his best to make it difficult for the prisoners.  There is some fantastic storytelling in this show and anyone interested in this sort of thing needs to fast track this to the top of the list.  It's on YouTube in full. 

Flying Leathernecks (1951)

Director: Nicholas Ray

Writers: James Edward Grang, Kenneth Gamet, Beirne Lay Jr.

Composer: Roy Webb

Starring: John Wayne, Robert Ryan, Don Taylor, Janis Carter, Jay C. Flippen, William Harrigan, James Bell, Barry Kelley, Maurice Jara, Adam Williams, James Dobson

More info: IMDb

Tagline: AIR-DEVILS OF THE SKY!

Plot: Major Kirby leads The Wildcats squadron into the historic WWII battle of Guadalcanal.

My rating: 6/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

You'd think by watching the trailer, some of the poster artwork and the title that this picture would be loaded with WWII action.  It's not.  In fact, there's very little action and that's a problem.  The romance stuff doesn't figure in much, which is good, but in this film any of it is too much.  On top of that, it's not all that enjoyable.  There's a good bit of by the numbers war drama which I expect in flicks of that kind from this era (and from John Wayne war pictures) but there's so little action that I feel like I was duped into thinking that was one thing when it's clearly another.   It's disappointing to say the least.  But then it's not a bad movie.  The actors do a fine job and no one is phoning it in.  Wayne, when he gives more than a rat's ass, does a good job as does Ryan but there's nothing all that exciting going on.  The Warner Bros. DVD looks great and the sole extra is the theatrical trailer.

The Battle of the Damned (1969)

Original title: Quella Dannata Pattuglia

Director: Roberto Biacnhi Montero

Writers: Roberto Biacnhi Montero, Arpad DeRiso, Giovanni Scolaro

Composer: Marcello Giombini

Starring: Dale Cummings, Maurice Poli, Herb Andress, Lex Monson, Maurizio Tocchi, Fabio Testi, Luciano Catenacci

More info: IMDb

Plot: After landing in North Africa in World War II, a group of soldiers led by Capt. Bruce Clay is assigned to attack an enemy position in order to destroy a large oil storage cellar in the desert.

My rating: 5/10

Will I watch it again? No.

The first three and a half minutes is stock WWII footage.  Then it's people hanging around an Army base mixed in with people talking in meetings and Col. Bruce Clay (wow, that name doesn't roll off the tongue, does it) getting all romancy with his woman.  25 minutes our small group of soldiers is on the move in Jeeps across the desert for their mission.  Some things happen that delay them from reaching their target and that's an hour in when they get there.  Twenty three minutes to go.  It's a very slow watch and it's the pacing that killed it for me.  The characters are cliches and there's nothing done with them that makes me care about them or even like them more than I'd like any other humans.  They're the good guys so I'll like them for that reason but I'd switch sides if the Jerrys had nice personalities.  The action is of the run and gun type which is all mediocre.  It's average with nothing much to offer.

The Young Lions (1958)

Director: Edward Dmytryk

Writers: Irwin Shaw, Edward Anhalt

Composer: Hugo Friedhofer

Starring: Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift, Dean Martin, Hope Lange, Barbara Rush, May Britt, Maximilian Schell, Dora Doll, Lee Van Cleef, L.Q. Jones, Gordon Mitchell

More info: IMDb

Tagline: 20th CENTURY-FOX PRESENTS ALL THE DAYS AND NIGHTS OF the Young Lions

Plot: The destiny of three soldiers during World War II. The German officer Christian Diestl approves less and less of the war. Jewish-American Noah Ackerman deals with antisemitism at home and in the army while entertainer Michael Whiteacre transforms from playboy to hero.

My rating: 7/10

Will I watch it again?  Maybe.

I first saw this more than twenty years ago and I remember that I liked Martin, I liked Brando's character arc and I didn't like Clift at all.  Now that I've seen it again, I feel the same way.  Martin's got charisma in spades and he was well cast to add some charm and happy go lucky but grounded humor.  Brando with bright blonde hair makes for a great looking German officer.  Then there's Clift who offers up the mental and emotional struggles of a soldier but he's got the added weight of representing today's youth who don't want to fight and he has hopes and dreams beyond what he's forced into.  He also constantly looks like he's in pain and that he's carrying the weight of the world. This also has him looking like he's trying to hard to act.  Martin and Brando make it look so easy.  It's a good story, following these guys around, but it's easy to grow tired of the Noah Ackerman (Clift) thread as his drama slow the picture down.  The movie's almost three hours long and it's short on action.  I liked the ending where the three characters we've been following merge.  That's a powerful moment.  The 20th Century Fox DVD looks fantastic in anamorphic widescreen.  For extras, you get a lousy trailer for 20th Century Fox war pictures, the theatrical trailer for this film (anamorphic widescreen) and more trailers.

Cross of Iron (1977)

Director: Sam Peckinpah

Writers: Julius J. Epstein, Walter Kelley, James Hamilton, Will Heinrich

Composer: Ernest Gold

Starring: James Coburn, Maximilian Schell, James Mason, David Warner, Klaus Lowitsch, Vadim Glowna, Roger Fritz, Dieter Schidor, Senta Berger

More info: IMDb

Tagline: The Power of Peckinpah Has Never Been So Real...Or So Brilliant!

Plot: A German commander places a squad in extreme danger after its Sergeant refuses to lie for him.

My rating: 7.5/10

Will I watch it again?  Yes.

"Don't rejoice in his defeat, you men.  For though the world stood up and stopped the bastard, the bitch that bore him is in heat again." -- Bertolt Brecht

Man, I love that quote.  Thus ends Sam Peckinpah's WWII opus.  I really dig this flick.  The cast is amazing.  It's nice seeing Mason in his role as an aging German soldier.  He's doing something different.  Then there's David Warner who's always fun to watch and I can't get enough of that guy.  James Coburn is a top tier manly actor and it was great casting to pit him against Maximilian Schell.  If you're familiar with Peckinpah movies you know that you're going to get manly men doing manly things.  He doesn't pull his punches and I'm so happy that he got the chance to make a WWII flick and not a run of the mill one at that.  You'd think, being Peckinpah, he'd crank out a pro war film but it's just the opposite.  War is hell and he knows it and wants to tell you all about it.  It's a great flick that satisfies all of your slow motion needs.

The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell (1955)

Director: Otto Preminger

Writers: Milton Sperling, Emmet Lavery, Ben Hecht, Dalton Trumbo, Michael Wilson

Composer: Dimitri Tiomkin

Starring: Gary Cooper, Charles Bickford, Ralph Bellamy, Rod Steiger, Elizabeth Montgomery, Fred Clark, James Daly, Jack Lord, Peter Graves, Darren McGavin, Robert F. Simon, Charles Dingle, Dayton Lummis

More info: IMDb

Tagline: He defied the army and navy . . . and they gave him a Court Martial!

Plot: A dramatization of the American general and his court martial for publically complaining about High Command's dismissal and neglect of the aerial fighting forces.

My rating: 7/10

Will I watch it again?  No.

If you like your war dramas heavy on the drama and you love sitting in a courtroom for over an hour then this picture might be for you.  None of these things deter from this being a good picture.  It's technically well made.  The performances are good and it's neat seeing so many famous actors before they were famous.  I read that the family of Mitchell was disappointed in the casting of Cooper and they preferred Cagney because Mitchell was much shorter than Cooper and he had a hot headed temper.  Cooper doesn't play animated roles.  He's always very stoic and grounded much like Gregory Peck.  I'd like to see Cooper lose his shit one time and go on one hell of a mean streak tear.  He does fine in the role but I agree and thing Cagney would've been better suited.  Most of the film is the trial so knowing that helps prepare one for what's to come.  The title gives that away.  It's not so compelling that it warrants another watch but it is worth seeing once.

Atrocities of the Orient (1948)

Original title: Outrages of the Orient

AKA: Beast of the East

Directors: Carlos Vander Tolosa, William H. Jansen

Writer: Carlos Vander Tolosa

Composer: Julio Esteban Anguita

Starring: Linda Estrella, Alma Rosa Aguirre, Teddy Benavidez, Bimbo Danao, Mona Lisa, Fernando Royo

More info: IMDb

Tagline: See women tortured with unspeakable barbarity!

Plot: Filipinos fight the Japanese in 1944 but the enemy doesn't go lightly.

My rating: 4/10

Will I watch it again?  Nope.

Promoted as a film that shows the horrors of the Japanese soldiers defiling the Filipino women, we only get a taste of that in the opening village attack.  After that we follow a small group of locals fighting the Japanese and another group of locals in a makeshift POW camp.  The Japanese are portrayed as cold hearted evil bastards and the Filipinos are heroic, lovable and fun.  Naturally.  It's the good guys against the bad guys.  The picture quality of the print I have is horrible but there's no mistaking some late '40s sleaze...

This is from the opening attack.  After that there's no sleaze and it's all war drama and action and it's pretty bad, too.  The script and some of the dialogue are corny, especially in the death scenes.  The actors milk it for all they can.  Some of it is groan-inducing.  Something Weird Video's site says this was a film that American producer put together from two films he bought, BEAST OF THE EAST and OUTRAGES OF THE ORIENT.  One some level I guess it's somewhat interesting to see a different part of WWII than what we're used to but overall the movie is just OK with the only thing worth seeing is the opening attack...you know, the sleazy shit.