Take a Hard Ride

Time for a little genre crossover today, one I love, one I'm fascinated by if I don't really like. The love genre? The spaghetti western. The disappointing fascination? Blaxploitation. Both genres were fan friendly flicks that weren't going to rewrite film, but dammit, they were going to be entertaining in a low budget fashion. Today's combo flick? That's 1975's Take a Hard Ride.

Having helped deliver a herd of cattle to market, a cowboy named Pike (Jim Brown) finds himself in a sticky spot. The rancher in charge of the herd dies soon after selling his cattle, begging Pike to return the money to his wife back at their ranch in northern Mexico. It's a hefty sum -- some $86,000 -- but Pike is a man of his word and intends to deliver the money. He begins to ride south toward Mexico, picking up some help in the form of shifty gambler, Tyree (Fred Williamson), and a mute tracker raised by Indians, Kashtok (Jim Kelly). The news of Pike's mission has spread like wildfire though, and anyone who can heft a gun is on their trail, all of them hoping to get their hands on that lucrative pile of money. One seems more dangerous than the others, a renegade bounty hunter named Kiefer (Lee Van Cleef), and he's not going to make this easy for Pike. Can the cowboy keep his word and get to Mexico safely?

What an interesting premise. This 1975 western had American and Italian backing so it's not a straight spaghetti western, but the down and dirty feel is still there. Director Antonio Margheriti shot his movie in the Canary Islands, giving 'Ride' a very distinct, unique look. No familiar locations here from countless other spaghetti westerns! The score leans more toward the American side and feels out of place at times. As a whole, the idea is pretty cool. You don't see a lot of African American actors starring in a western, much less three of them with some solid star power and name recognition. Throw three black actors into a spaghetti western formula and let things fall where they may. Now all that said....the idea is pretty good. What about the execution?

It falls short, but I'm gonna cover some positives first. The biggest positive is pretty easy to spot, and that's the cast, especially the leads. In Brown, Williamson and martial artist turned star Kelly, 'Ride' offers three of the biggest stars of the blaxploitation, three stars who had worked together a year before in 1974's Three the Hard Way. The cowboy, the gambler and the tracker are three archetypal characters in the western genre, and the trio has some fun with the roles. Brown is solid and not flashy, the quiet cowboy who believes in doing the right thing, even if that decision could prove deadly. Williamson gets the showiest part as Tyree, the gambler, a well-dressed, back-stabbing dandy who has no qualms about killing to get his hands on some money. In the coolest part, Kelly is mostly presence, his mute tracker killing quickly, efficiently and in brutal fashion at times.

Some cool characters for sure, and they look to be having a lot of fun throughout. I especially liked the dynamic between Brown's Pike and Williamson's Tyree, the duo reminding me some of Gary Cooper and Burt Lancaster in the very important 1954 western, Vera Cruz. These are two polar opposites, and that idea plays well. Pike wants to return the money no matter what, agreeing to let Tyree to tag along because an extra gun on the trail is never a bad thing. Oh, by the way, Tyree tells Pike he intends to kill him once they reach the end of the trail. Fun, huh? They have an excellent chemistry as two guys who aren't hiding anything. They're just waiting for their showdown somewhere down the trail. Also, that Lee Van Cleef guy is around too. He's awesome as always if underused. His presence is intimidating whether he's on-screen or not, a menacing gunman ready to dispatch whoever stands in his way.

Now, about that whole execution thing. I loved the premise of the movie, combining two hugely popular genres. The execution is a different story. It struggles to find a tone, juggling squib-heavy violence with buddy humor, and the blaxploitation's love of everything....well, how do I say this? Hatred of white people? The supporting characters are pretty cut and dry whether it's evil or stupid or both. Catherine Spaak plays Catherine, a widow on the trail with our heroes, prompting Tyree to say "Two black men, an Indian and a white woman." Laughs ensue! Barry Sullivan plays a law officer who puts away his badge to go after the money while Harry Carey Jr. and Robert Donner play two ignorant, bumbling cowboys doing the same. There's also some Johnny Rebs wanting to continue the Civil War, a greedy Mexican bandit, a cute Mexican boy, and two black guys on the trail who bitch and moan like a married couple. Talk about broad strokes.

With a 103-minute running time, things drifted too much for my liking. We get riding/talking scenes, brief shootout, campfire scene and then repeat. As well, the ending seems like one big old cop-out on numerous levels. Things build and build to a showdown, a proper shootout...and we don't get it. Now it may seem like I'm being overly critical, but I did enjoy this movie, just not as much as I would have liked. Still worth watching though, especially for western and blaxploitation fans alike. Even Dana Andrews makes a quick appearance early on!

Take a Hard Ride (1975): ** 1/2 /****

The Devil's Brigade

In tribute to all our veterans, here's a Memorial Day review. As a movie fan, Memorial Day was a huge weekend for me growing up. I looked forward to watching old war movies on TNT in round-the-clock marathons, WWII flicks that are some of my favorites like The Dirty Dozen, Kelly's Heroes and an underrated classic and one of my all-time favorites, 1968's The Devil's Brigade.

It's 1942 and with World War II very much yet to be decided, Lt. Colonel Robert Frederick (William Holden) has been summoned to a staff meeting in England. Even though he has no combat experience, Frederick is being given command of a new unit, the First Special Service Force. Their ultimate mission is still to be decided but the Colonel prepares for the training that awaits his brigade that consists of a crack unit of well-trained Canadian troops commanded by Dunkirk veteran Maj. Alan Crown (Cliff Robertson) and an unruly, misfit group of American troops headed by the similarly unruly Maj. Cliff Bricker (Vince Edwards). The two sides bristle immediately, but training continues. If Frederick can manage to keep his men together, their services are very much needed, including a dangerous mission on the Italian front.

From veteran director Andrew McLaglen, 'Brigade' is based on a real-life military unit, the First Special Service Force. Released just a year after The Dirty Dozen, it bears some striking similarities, but it more than capably carves out its own niche in war movie department. It is one of the great men-on-a-mission movies, and that's saying something considering the late 1960s were rampant with them. McLaglen filmed on location in Italy for much of the second half of the movie, giving an authentic look and feel to the proceedings as the Brigade goes into battle. Composer Alex North turns in a gem of a soundtrack, his theme for the Brigade (listen HERE) one that you'll be whistling for days. The main theme is a highlight, but North specializes in the quieter, darker and more sinister moments leading up to the battle in the finale.

More of a workmanlike director than an auteur, McLaglen specialized in movies like this with impressive casts of male stars. This 1968 WWII flick is loaded with star power. As Colonel Frederick, Holden doesn't get a flashy part, but he leads the way just the same. His officer wants to prove himself while also proving how capable his men are too. The best part in the film goes to Robertson as Maj. Crown, an intelligent, well-spoken and brutally capable officer who survived the Dunkirk disaster. It is a smart, underplayed role, and he steals every scene he's in. As his American counterpart, Edwards too is very solid. His Maj. Bricker is blunt and without a filter, a scrounger and hustler with the best of them. Also look for Dana Andrews, Michael Rennie and Carroll O'Connor as American generals, all making cameo appearances.

Ah, yes, and then there's the rest of the cast. If the star power above wasn't enough, McLaglen assembles a deep, talented cast of tough guys to fill out the ranks of the brigade. Leading the American contingent, look for Claude Akins, Andrew Prine, Richard Jaeckel, Luke Askew, Tom Troupe, Bill Fletcher and Tom Stern. For the Canadian half of the Brigade, watch out for Jack Watson, Harry Carey Jr., Jeremy Slate, Richard Dawson and Jean-Paul Vignon. It's cool just seeing all these recognizable faces here together, some leaving more of an impression than others. Jaeckel as Omar Greco, an acrobat trying to escape but finding a home instead, especially stands out as does Akins as Rocky, the American bully, Prine as Ransom, a smart misfit, Watson as Peacock, the tough but gentlemanly Canadian and Slate as O'Neill, the hand-to-hand combat instructor.

I think it's the cast that separates the movie from so many other solid WWII movies. It's a familiar formula here; introduce everyone, train them, have them put their differences aside following some male bonding and then unleash them on the enemy. The male bonding comes courtesy of a barroom brawl (watch HERE) with some rowdy lumberjacks, a great scene. The script is ideal in its ability to let these tough guys be tough guys. It's fun, natural with chemistry and features some great one-liners. Other highlights include Slate's introduction in a showdown with Akins (watch HERE), a 30-mile hike where the rivalry develops further, and many others. Moral of the story is this, we need these parts to be effective for the second half of the movie to truly work. And you bet it does.

The last hour follows the Brigade as it enters combat. Required to prove themselves and their ability, Frederick leads a patrol behind the lines to a heavily guarded Italian town crawling with Germans. It's a lighter action scene, but memorable just the same. The best part though is in the finale, the Brigade ordered to attack the apparently impenetrable Mount la Difensa (where the Service Force really made a name for themselves), a mountain garrisoned by German infantry and heavy armor. First, they must scale a sheer cliff-face to mount a surprise attack on the garrison. It is a great action sequence, McLaglen filming in the trenches and dugouts as the Brigade begins their assault. We always know where the battle is, where it's going, and the sheer scale of it. When the casualties do come (and they do, quickly and with some surprises), it makes this extended battle sequence that much more effective emotionally.

This has always been one of my favorites, and I seem to pick something new up with each passing viewing (I'm guessing I'm somewhere between 20 and 30). This time? The darkness late, Frederick greeting his men as they prepare for battle. North's score goes dark, Dawson explaining "Haven't you ever heard a man say goodbye?" It's an eerie, uncomfortable moment. Spot-on too, considering the Brigade sustained 77% casualties in the coming battle. 'Brigade' doesn't have the reputation of so many other WWII movies of the time, but it deserves some attention. A hidden gem.

The Devil's Brigade (1968): ****/****
* Rewrite of June 2010 review

The Westerner

Just over two years ago -- good lord, I'm getting old -- I wrote a review of the 1972 revisionist western The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean. Based ever so loosely on the life of Judge Roy Bean, it's a mess of a movie if a quasi-interesting one. Some 30 years earlier though, an earlier film delved into the life of the infamous western figure. Interesting, but like its predecessor, still flawed. And away we go with 1940's The Westerner.

As settlers and homesteaders move into the wilds of Texas in the years following the Civil War, one man maintains his iron rule on his own territory. That man is Judge Roy Bean (Walter Brennan), a self-appointed judge who lives and rules by a very strict set of rules and laws. His typical verdict is simple no matter the crime; hanging. One day, the Judge meets a prisoner that he can't quite bring to send to the hanging tree. That man is Cole Harden (Gary Cooper), an amiable enough, fast talking cowboy making his way from job to job. Cole is accused of stealing a man's horse, and if there was ever a crime worthy of hanging in the old west, it would be horse thieving. The drifting cowboy is able to save himself from the noose, and he makes a fast friend in Judge Roy Bean. Their friendship though is threatened by an escalating range war, the cowboys readying to fight the homesteaders.

I liked a lot about this 1940 western from director William Wyler. For starters, the black and white look is perfect from the start. The outdoor scenes were filmed in the desert around Tucson, Arizona, adding a sense of realism to the story. The indoor scenes are mostly relegated to Bean's saloon-turned-courthouse in the Texas border country, almost like a play. I won't mention each of the names involved with the script -- there's 6 different names according to IMDB -- but the final product is full of darkly funny scenes that mix well with some great dialogue between Brennan and Cooper. A very natural back and forth makes any scene the duo is in that much more entertaining.

Having already won two Best Supporting Actor awards (1936 and 1938), Brennan made it a third win with his performance here as Judge Roy Bean. It is by far the best thing going for this Wyler-directed western. He makes a pretty nasty character always interesting to watch, if not particularly likable. He lives and rules by his own special laws which are steadfast....until they don't benefit him, in which case he tweaks the rules. Bean is stringent in that once he's ruled, the ruling is done. At one point, the Judge even hangs a man....a man who's already dead. Bean also has one obsession; his love for stage actress Lilly Langtry (Lilian Bond). His saloon is decorated with posters and cards and postcards of the lovely actress. He's never seen her, never met her, but he's desperately and madly in love. It's an oddly human (if not quite endearing) trait to one nasty dude.

For about 45 minutes, I loved this movie. We're introduced to Bean, his town and his posse of 'Yes Men' gunfighters (Paul Hurst and Chill Wills among them), and then Cooper's Cole (no relation to the real-life Cole Hardin) appears on the scene seemingly a sure thing for the hangman's noose. It is an extended scene with its intro and fallout that lasts more than 30 minutes. Bean in all his self-righteous judgment and Cole in his desperation to save his own skin are perfect with some surprisingly funny exchanges. Cooper was worried heading into the movie that Brennan would overshadow his secondary part, and he's right to a point, but he does a solid job (as expected) as the laconic but quick-thinking Cole. The running scene has several sight gags, some interesting twists and a great payoff. If only the rest of the movie could have kept up that energy, but unfortunately, it just doesn't.

The last half of the movie follows Cole and the Judge on opposite sides of a range war. No one seems to be able to convince Bean of anything, but he respects Cole (while also wanting one of the cowboy's prize possessions) enough to listen to him. Well, sort of. The range war feels forced, especially the slamming of a love interest -- Doris Davenport as Jane Ellen, the daughter of a farmer (Fred Stone) --  smack dab right into a story that just didn't need it. The range war offers a couple surprising twists, but the second half just never maintains the energy or momentum of the first half of the movie. Still a worthwhile movie for Brennan and Cooper throughout, but it's a mixed bag in the end because of the disappointing second half. Also look for Forrest Tucker and Dana Andrews.

The Westerner (1940): ** 1/2 /****

Smoke Signal

If you believe everything movies show us -- and why shouldn't we? -- then the wild west was composed of one Indian uprising after another. If you stack them up one on top of another, there must have been a bloody uprising every other day. Westerns have certainly shown their fair share of such uprisings like 1955's Smoke Signal.

Leading a small patrol toward a remote outpost, Captain Harper (William Talman) and his men almost ride into a trap as the beginning of a Ute uprising. Under attack, the patrol sneaks into the fort and finds that Ute war parties have been attacking all over the region. The reason? Harper thinks it's because an Army deserter, Halliday (Dana Andrews), who supposedly conspired with the Utes, has been captured and is in the outpost that is now severely outnumbered. An attack is looming when Halliday puts forth an idea. What if the garrison tries to sail down the nearby Colorado River? The river is within reach of the fort, and now it's just a matter of if they can sneak past the Ute lookouts.

For the most part, this B-western from director Jerry Hopper is just that, a B-western. It wraps things up in a tidy 88-minute package and has a good mix of action, tension and....okay, there's a forced in love interest too. They can't all be winners, can they? Yeah, Andrew's bad boy Halliday is quite the rebel. Everyone hates him because he supposedly betrayed his unit two years earlier, a decision that cost the lives of several soldiers. Come on. Would Dana Andrews be a bad guy? I think not. But that bad boy quality appeals to Laura (Piper Laurie), the daughter of the recently killed outpost commander. She just can't help herself. Thankfully, that awful, never so subtle love story is held off until the last 30 minutes or so. Instead, the focus is on the thing that makes this movie worthwhile.

I figured I was in for a pretty typical western when the patrol arrives at the cavalry outpost. That's not a bad thing in my head. I've watched many a western like that, and I'll probably watch many more; outnumbered cavalry fighting off overwhelming Indian attacks. 'Signal' doesn't go down that route. Rather than go meekly into a massacre, the garrison takes the boats long since left at the fort and rides them down the Colorado River and hopefully to safety. It's a cool departure from the typical cavalry vs. Indians movie. As a bonus, we get some very cool footage of the troopers making their way down the Colorado. It's as imposing a physical marker as there is in the American Southwest. Granted, there's also some really cheesy inserts of Andrews and the cast "floating on the river." Yeah, we're talking very fake shots of the real-life Colorado with the cast on a very real studio set full of water. Still, it's a pretty cool addition to a well-worn formula.

One of the most solid if unspectacular movie stars around, Dana Andrews is a solid if very unsexy pick to play Halliday, the cavalry deserter now working to prove he isn't guilty of the court martial charges hanging over his head. He just isn't a flashy actor, but it's a solid enough part. Along with the vengeful Capt. Harper (seeking revenge for his brother's death because of Halliday's actions), Rex Reason plays Lt. Wayne Ford, a fellow officer full of hate. Douglas Spencer has some fun as Garode, a frontier trapper/drifter who gets caught up in the action. The cavalry troopers include Milburn Stone as Miles, a soldier on Halliday's side, William Schallert as Livingston, the blinded soldier, Gordon Jones as Cpl. Rogers, the former riverboat man, Robert J. Wilke as Sgt. Daly, the loyal NCO, and Pat Hogan as Delche, the superstitious Indian scout.

So like its star in Dana Andrews, this is a solid, entertaining and generally pretty forgettable B-western. The focus is more on the dynamic among the survivors as opposed to the constant threat of attack from the warring Utes. Talman and Reason end up being bigger villains than the attacking Indians, both men blindly writing off Halliday as a traitor and a coward. The script does feature some twists as the boat trip down the Colorado continues, and everything is wrapped up nicely in the end. Worth a watch...once.

Smoke Signal (1955): ** 1/2 /****

Zero Hour!

As a stand-alone film, 1957's Zero Hour! has no real business being remembered as anything but a pretty bad B-movie full of wooden acting and poorly-made effects. Now, it's not exactly a well-known, fan favorite some 50-plus years later, but it does have a certain claim to fame. It is the source for one of the all-time great spoofs, 1980's classic Airplane! On that tidbit of trivia alone, this is a movie worth a watch....once.

It's been ten years since the end of WWII, but former fighter pilot Ted Stryker (Dana Andrews) still struggles with a command decision that cost the lives of several members of his squadron. He's been bouncing from job to job, and his wife, Ellen (Linda Darnell), is threatening to leave him. Returning from a job interview, Ted finds that Ellen has taken their son, Joey, and has left him. He tracks them down, buys a ticket on their plane with hopes of winning her back. The odds are against him though. Something happens to both the pilot and co-pilot, forcing the air crew to ask if anyone on-board can fly a plane. With some 40-odd lives at stake, can Ted pull it together and land the plane?

It's been years since I've seen Airplane! but it's hard to watch the 1957 movie without cracking up at the very premise. Maybe back in the 1950s this was looked at as a solid, entertaining thrill-ride, but now? It plays like a spoof of itself. It's high drama on steroids! The acting is atrocious -- Darnell yelling and screaming 'MOUNTAINS!' is priceless -- and you can't help but wonder why it took 23 years to make a spoof of this flick. It was ripe for the picking, and when given the chance, the 1980 spoof classic did not disappoint in the least. Robert Hays' character is even named Ted Striker, "I" instead of "Y' in this case.

What amused me is that the situation -- a passenger forced to fly the plane -- is dripping with natural tension. Anyone who's ever gotten on a plane has at least briefly thought about the possibility. If not flying the plane, at least something out of the ordinary happening. So right off the bat, there is that tension watching the movie. You're thousands of feet up in the air, and your life depends on some schlub taken from his seat to fly an airliner? So yes, there is some excitement in the movie. But there is too much working against it. Besides the main cast, it appears they picked people off the street to read lines. At different points, you can see cast members apparently looking off screen to read cue cards. The music is blaring at you in the most obvious of fashion -- DUN DUN DUH!!!!! -- that something bad is going to happen, and we see the same effects repeatedly of the plane flying through fog, clouds and rain.

So here's the situation. You've got a former fighter pilot in a life and death situation being talked down by a airliner pilot who used to fly with him and still holds a grudge. How about we pick two of the most wooden, nondescript actors to play those parts? It's a story that literally revolves around life and death. It sounds like logical thinking, don't you think? God bless them both, but Andrews and Sterling Hayden were not good choices for these parts. Andrews was a likable enough actor on screen, but he's not one to carry a movie. Hayden as Captain Martin Treleaven, the on-the-ground link to the possibly doomed plane, is an equally poor choice. Basically no matter the part, Hayden had one pitch to his voice; deep and stilted, no real emotion. So when he's yelling at Stryker to "PULL UP! YOU'RE TOO LOW!" it isn't dramatic, it's funny. For me at least, that ruins any of the tension or drama the story naturally builds up.

It's not just the fault of the two stars in Andrews and Hayden. The whole story and execution comes across as ridiculous. The pilot (pro football player Elroy Hirsch) and co-pilot, along with many of the passengers, become deathly ill because they eat contaminated fish as opposed to the regular "meat" option for dinner. Could it happen? Sure, but it sounds nuts. Oh, no, contaminated fish! There's also the screaming hysterical woman who needs to be slapped at the slightest bit of turbulence, the passenger (Jerry Paris) who uses a hand puppet to calm down the Stryker boy, the doctor (Geoffrey Toone) who is freakishly calm and knows everything, and the stalwart stewardess (Peggy King) who is the main culprit reading her cue cards.

Everything almost from the start comes across as half-baked. And a broken marriage being saved because the husband finally faced his fears? Oh, that's sweet. I was very surprised to see the high rating (6.8 as I write this) at IMDB, mostly because I thought it was unintentionally hilarious. It could and probably should have worked as high drama, but instead it produces laughs....lots of them. Good to watch once, mostly to see all the inspirations for the much better and intentionally funny Airplane! It is worth sticking around for Hayden's final line, a classic delivery in the lack of emotion department considering what's just happened.

Zero Hour! <---TCM clips (1957): **/****

The Satan Bug

Because guns, grenades and bombs weren't good enough at killing people, a new type of weapon started to be developed in the 20th century. It started as early as WWI with mustard and poison gas being used during trench warfare. It escalated and became more sophisticated, more efficient over the years. As part of the Cold War mutual destruction strategy, world powers turned to scientists to give them an edge in fighting...a different sort of fighting. Germ and chemical warfare became a topic of conversation, little strands of diseases that could destroy the world in minutes, days, and weeks without a weapon fired. That's the background for 1965's The Satan Bug.

This is one of those hidden gems that you're glad you stumbled upon, in this case, because of the director of the film, John Sturges. I knew his other movies like The Magnificent Seven and The Great Escape so reading through his list of films, I happened upon this one, a well-made and exciting if at times confusing espionage thriller centered around germ and chemical warfare. It is based on a novel by Alistair MacLean of Guns of Navarone and Where Eagles Dare fame, originally published under his pseudonym Ian Stuart. In a different setting from his usual WWII adventures, some changes were made to MacLean's book for the movie version, transplanting the story from dreary old England to the arid, dry American southwest. It is the rare novel that makes it to film completely the same as it was written, but as far as novel-to-film transformations go, this is a good one.

At remote, isolated and heavily guarded Station 3 somewhere in the Southwestern desert, two men are killed and several flasks of a recently developed germ/disease strand have been stolen. The robbery and murder seem too perfect considering the heavy security at the facility, but former security head and all-around rebel Lee Barrett (George Maharis) is called in to investigate. He's given some sobering news early on in his investigation. One strand of botulinus that's been stolen has the potential to wipe out hundreds and thousands of lives but has a short life once its oxidizes. The other strand is far more dangerous, a world killer that if unleashed will destroy every living thing on Earth. What mastermind orchestrated the job, and more importantly, what do they intend to do with the new formula, dubbed simply the Satan Bug. Up against the clock, Barrett has to figure out who did it, why, and where exactly the flasks are. Can he do it in time though?

If I had to pick a decade as my favorite in terms of movies, it would be the 1960s, and the decision isn't a tough one. I love the epic quality, the stars, the character actors, and especially the style. In one of the great descriptions I've ever read of an era, one reviewer pointed out that The Satan Bug is one of the last hurrahs of the suit and hat. This movie has style. All the characters wear a suit and tie and stylish hats as they race all over the Southwest looking for these disease-filled flasks. These aren't rogue agents who look like bums off the street. These are the good guys, and they're going to look good catching the bad guys. The sets scream 1960s leisurely style, and composer Jerry Goldsmith turns in an eerie, unsettling score that keeps things moving at a brisk pace. It  will also ring in your head for a couple days so beware of that too. Sometimes all a movie needs to work is that style, and The Satan Bug is a very cool movie to watch.

As a director over four decades with more than 40 movies to his name, Sturges made a career out of tough guy movies with typically male-dominated casts (Great Escape, Mag7, Bad Day at Black Rock), and while the big star name recognition doesn't qualify here, the cast is still impressive. Maharis is a good lead, the super intelligent investigator who pieces things together quicker than any man should be able to do. He's also worried about ex-wife Mary (Anne Francis), but that's understandable. Dana Andrews is General Andrews, a former military man who still holds a mysterious position in the government who also happens to be Barrett's father-in-law. Richard Basehart is Dr. Hoffman, one of Station 3's top doctors who include John Larkin and Simon Oakland. John Anderson plays Reagan, the security officer in charge of Station 3, albeit briefly. Richard Bull is Cavanaugh, a police investigator working with Barrett to catch Ed Asner and Frank Sutton, two of the murdering thieves. Yes, Lou Grant and Sgt Carter as bad guys. It takes some getting used to. The star quality might not be there, but the cast makes up for it, working smoothly together from the start.

Now I like this movie, but I can admit I have no idea what's going on half the time. My first viewing? I must have watched it in a daze, only to review it a couple days later. I understood more if not everything.  MacLean's novel The Satan Bug is a mystery thriller, throwing lots of characters and suspects at you. It's just hard to keep up. In the movie, characters are introduced, killed off, and then we find out they were important much later. Nothing is spelled out at all, forcing the viewer to jump to or make their own conclusions. Not always the best idea when it comes to movies.  Maharis' Barrett makes some ridiculous jumps in logic too, piecing together pieces of evidence so effortlessly that it is almost laughable. By the end, I feel I've got some sort of grip on what was happening, but it is all relative. Explanations, reasoning, development, not really present at any point.

Just like MacLean's novel, the movie takes some liberties with these mankind-killing diseases, but I won't spoil them here. They're supposedly able to wipe out men everywhere...except...well, it doesn't matter. But if Barrett needs to survive, he comes up with some off-the-wall plan to postpone death, mostly because the story requires his presence. These characters are also surprisingly lax with an easily breakable flask carrying the disease that will literally wipe out the Earth. This isn't a great movie, and it might not even be a good movie, but the 1960s style and ensemble cast make up for the lack of logic in the rest of the movie. It is available to watch at Youtube, starting HERE with Part 1 of 11.

The Satan Bug <---trailer (1965): ***/****

A Walk in the Sun

Somewhat out of necessity and somewhat because of audience demand, Hollywood studios during World War II often turned to patriotic, flag-waving war stories for their movies as opposed to more realistic, balanced looks at the war. Some examples like John Ford’s They Were Expendable peg the Americans as courageous, infallible heroes while the Japanese are the vicious, murdering enemy, but the movie still manages to be an above average entry into the WWII movie genre.

Now of course, all of them weren’t propaganda pictures meant to influence public thought and sentiment about the direction the war was taking or how despicably evil the enemy was. Released in 1945 at the tail end of the war, A Walk in the Sun could easily be pegged as one of those movies, but it rises above that stigma. It doesn’t try to portray the American soldiers in Europe as supermen who can’t be taken down by a whole army of German infantry. On the other side, the Germans are a faceless enemy, but never a demonic one. This is war, and everyone is affected. Just like my previous few of All Quiet on the Western Front, these are soldiers interested in survival, not some higher meaning or purpose in war.

Huddled in a landing craft headed for an Italian beach in the dead of night, an American infantry platoon prepares for the mission ahead of them. Problems start immediately though when the platoon commander and the second-ranking officer are both killed in the landing. Taking over, Sergeant Porter (Herbert Rudley, looking like a dead ringer for Frank Lovejoy) and Sergeant Tyne (Dana Andrews) must now figure out what to do. Their mission was described only vaguely to them; march six miles inland and knock out a key farmhouse along the main road. Little is known what awaits them along the road or the enemy strength at the farmhouse, but they head out into the unknown hoping to accomplish their mission, and hopefully make it back alive.

Any similarities or comparisons to ‘Western Front’ are fair for two reasons. One, director Lewis Milestone directed both movies. Two, they are both based on strong source novels that provide a great blueprint for the story. The reasons ‘Walk’ works is because of similar reasons. This is not an action-heavy story, instead portraying the life of a soldier as it more likely is; long stretches of boredom balanced with extreme fear/terror broken up by seconds of violent chaos. What do the soldiers do in between engagements? They talk. They talk about their worries, their lives back home, their thoughts on the patrol. You name it, it gets covered. A story that puts you right there on the dusty road with the soldiers and gives you an authentic feel for what they’re going through always gets points in my book.

This has to be one of the earlier examples of a ‘unit picture,’ a story that focuses on a specific group of soldiers, sometimes as large as a division or a brigade on down the ladder to a group like a squad or a platoon. Dana Andrews is the star here, the sergeant thrust into a position of power, leading his men on a mission where he knows little to nothing about what they’re supposed to accomplish. Along with Rudley as Porter, the NCO about to crack, the platoon includes Lloyd Bridges as Ward, a sergeant and a farmer back home with a craving for an apple, John Ireland as Windy, an intelligent soldier who is constantly writing letters back home in a unique way, Richard Conte as Rivera, the motor-mouth machine gunner, George Tyne as Friedman, Rivera’s ammunition carrier and sounding board, and Norman Lloyd as Archimbeau, a private convinced the war is destined to go on for years, among many others who make a quick appearance, but never really rise above being a sea of infantry faces. Burgess Meredith narrates.

Every so often at the IMDB, you run across a description so perfect it makes it worthwhile to continue to peruse all the other garbage people post there. One very accurate poster said this 1945 WWII story could easily have been renamed ‘A Talk in the Sun.’ It’s a fair assessment. Of a story that clocks in at 117 minutes, this is a dialogue heavy movie so if you’re looking for action packed excitement, keep looking. I’m all for dialogue in a movie (good, well-written dialogue that is), and for the most part, the conversation is good here.  Eventually though, it gets tedious.  How many times can we hear Rivera and Friedman argue like an old married couple? How many times will Archimbeau talk about the coming battle in 1955 for Tibet? Some scenes drag more than others, but late in the movie, I started to feel like I was watching the same scenes over and over again. Is that what a soldier’s life is like? Probably, but realism only takes a movie so far.

Balancing the long stretches of boredom here are those chaotic, brief moments of terror where your life can be snatched away from you in the blink of an eye. The patrol is constantly under bombardment while also dealing with patrolling German fighters overhead and tank and armored car patrols. The farmhouse (Semi SPOILERS I guess, yes, they make it to the farmhouse) is heavily guarded, and a suicidal charge across an open field feels like the only solution. Like the best parts of the movie, the battle scenes are well-executed (similar to Milestone’s action in Western Front with some great camerawork) and always keeping you on edge as to what will happen. It’s not a perfect war story, but for a movie released in 1945, the realism and honest look at the life of a soldier help make up for any shortcomings the movie might have. A public domain movie, it is available to watch at Youtube HERE in a somewhat washed out but tolerable print.

A Walk in the Sun <---TCM clips (1945): ***/****