Paratroop Command

It's that face you recognize but don't necessarily know the name. He plays that background character, that supporting part that doesn't dominate the screentime but still plays a key part in a movie.  Yes, we're talking another review about character actors.  Name recognition in a big movie star has suckered me into countless movies, but often enough, it is the supporting cast that has pulled me into a movie. Today, our character actor of the day is Richard Bakalyan.

A movie and TV actor who's still chugging along at 82, Bakalyan made a career of those supporting roles.  I first noticed him as one of the few American prisoners in Von Ryan's Express, but he's been in a ton of other movies.  He was in Chinatown, Fox and the Hound and several other Disney movies, countless TV shows in guest starring roles, and even a couple of bad beach movies. Never a huge star, he didn't get many chances at a leading role, but when he did, he didn't disappoint, like 1959's Paratroop Command.

Jumping into North Africa with his squad, a private, Charlie (Bakalyan), is separated from his unit almost immediately. He finally catches up with them after they've knocked out a German machine gun nest and mistakenly shoots one of his squad-mates who is dressed as a German soldier. Separated from the rest of the men so quickly, the survivors think Charlie had turned tail and run, scared at the thought of fighting. Now, it gets piled on as they believe he's murdered one of their own in cold-blooded fashion. As the unit moves forward, also jumping into Italy and Sicily.  Alienated from his squad who would like nothing more than to see him get picked off, Charlie begins to believe he's a bad luck charm. As the fighting rages on, can he prove he is a good soldier?

I caught this movie several years back on AMC, and then rewatched it again recently as part of a Memorial Day Marathon.  It is only available now in a hard-to-find VHS tape and is not shown regularly so actually tracking the movie down can be difficult.  This is certainly different from most WWII movies I've reviewed here mostly because the budget seems to be about $20 bucks or so.  Director William Witney has the California hills stand in for Africa and Italy in locations you will almost assuredly have seen in countless western TV episodes and movies, not to mention "Korea" from M.A.S.H. The movie is just 77 minutes long and isn't interested in any wasted subplots. The story still manages to bounce around quite a bit, but it's always entertaining.

With that small budget, certain movies would be limited.  For 'Paratroop,' the scale certainly isn't on a grand scale.  We see these "invasions" from the point of view of this one squad, never getting a bigger picture of the battle or the conflict.  The squad's officer (Ken Lynch) briefs his men (and us as the viewer) just seconds before they will jump out of the planes as to what to expect from the coming fight. The firefights are on a squad-level scale, not a large-scale battlefield. It's a few men with machine guns vs. Germans with machine guns. Survival at its most basic.  For a low budget B-movie, the action is handled surprisingly well too, and there's a lot of it.  Just don't go in looking for a BIG war movie, and you'll enjoy this one.

Made on that smaller scale, some movies lose perspective because they try to make the finished product something bigger, something grander.  'Paratroop' stays grounded in its attempt, and gets points for staying on an appropriate level.  If anything, the story and tone can go much darker, much more realistic than a film with higher aspirations and a bigger budget. How many WWII movies do you see (from the 1950s much less) where an American soldier guns down another American soldier? Even if its accidental, that's not exactly audience-friendly. After Charlie's accidental shooting, some fellow soldiers even start to gun for him in combat situations. This isn't a cynical Vietnam movie where officers are getting fragged by their own men. This is a 1959 WWII movie made on a modest budget. The movie is that much better for it.

Dark in terms of story and tone, the ending comes as the biggest surprise.  SPOILERS from here on out SPOILERS  The squad is dropped into Salerno with the mission of finding a hidden German tank battalion somewhere in the Italian countryside.  They have to find it, call it in, and get the hell out quickly.  They find it easily enough, but are quickly on the defensive against a much larger German force.  The squad starts dropping like flies, and for a 1959 movie, the violence is surprisingly graphic with a fair share of blood used.  Most surprising? Charlie's redemption. Needing to get the radio generator to the Lieutenant, he walks into a mine to clear a path for a wounded squad-mate.  Just because it's a B-movie doesn't mean it can't be effective. It's a great, moving ending. END OF SPOILERS

Looking past the obvious limitations of a B-movie on a small budget, 'Paratroop' has been generally forgotten because the cast features very few recognizable names, much less big time stars.  Bakalyan is the tragic lead, the paratrooper that nothing can go right for.  Usually relegated to those background parts, it's always fun to see character actors get their shot at a lead, especially here.  Lynch's Lieutenant (no other name provided) is the officer trying to keep all his men on the same page.  The rest of the squad includes Jack Hogan as trigger-happy Ace, gunning for Charlie, Jimmy Murphy as the squad sergeant, Jeff Morris as Pigpen, and James Beck as Cowboy, and even an uncredited and unlisted Robert Conrad. An all-around above average WWII B-movie.    

Paratroop Command (1959): ***/****