FILM REVIEW OF "DUNKIRK" (2017)

Traditional armchair generals should know Christopher Nolan's World War II epic "Dunkirk" (** OUT OF ****) has little to do with the battle of Dunkirk. You won't see German Panzer Corps careening through Belgium and plowing into France. In fact, the only Germans in "Dunkirk" are either flying aircraft (so cannot see them) or show up as infantry from unknown units. Instead, "Dunkirk" confines itself strictly to the evacuation of the British Expeditionary Forces (B.E.F.) in three segments: one on land covering one week, one on sea covering one day, and one in the air covering one hour. Of course, much, much more occurred at Dunkirk than just the wholesale evacuation. Presumably, the "Dark Knight" filmmaker didn’t want to overwhelm himself with an ambitious battle extravaganza. "Dunkirk" was produced for $100-million, and likely millions went to publicity. So, if you're looking for something like "The Longest Day" (1962), "Battle of the Bulge" (1965), "Anzio" (1968), "A Bridge Too Far" (1977), "Saving Private Ryan" (1998), and "Hacksaw Ridge" (2016), prepare to be disappointed. "Dunkirk" doesn't recreate historic battlefield combat, not even the infamous Wormhoudt Massacre.  Adolf Hitler’s Waffen-SS soldiers slaughtered as many as 80 British soldiers along with some French POWs. The cold-hearted SS crowded these prisoners into a stable, tossed in stick-grenades, and then finished them off with bursts of machine gun fire. Something like this might have given "Dunkirk" greater dramatic gravity. Instead, we see neither German tanks nor troops storming through France and Belgium. This 107-minute movie boils down to a series of survival episodes that occurred at Dunkirk.  Notably, the RAF preferred to confine their resources largely to the island in preparation for the inevitable Battle of Britain, later made into the exemplary film "Battle of Britain" (1969). Along with the RAF, the courageous Royal Navy and the Small Boat Owners emerge as the heroes who rescued the BEF waiting anxiously on the beach.

"Dunkirk" opens with several British infantrymen sauntering down a road inside the Dunkirk city limits as the Luftwaffe showers them with propaganda leaflets. No sooner have they had a moment to glance at these surrender summons than gunfire erupts from an unknown source. As they scramble for cover, unseen shooters kill all them except Tommy (newcomer Fiona Whitehead), who crosses a street and comes under fire then from French troops. They wave him toward their lines, and later he wanders onto the beaches. As far as he can see, queues of troops are standing on the beach awaiting transport. "Spectre" lenser Hoyte Van Hoytema's atmospheric cinematography shows these soldiers in their brown uniforms standing like ducks in neat, orderly rows on white beaches. These scenes resemble something out of "Lawrence of Arabia" in all their sprawling immensity.  Van Hoytema's cinematography adds to the spectacle of the event. Not long afterward, as Tommy tours the beach, screaming Stuka dive-bombers plunge from the skies, seeding the beaches with bombs. The worst death in "Dunkirk" occurs when one of these bombs blast a British soldier to smithereens as he shoots vainly at a Stuka. Tommy meets another soldier under mysterious circumstances on the beach. Might he be a German saboteur? Without challenging him about his strange behavior, Tommy pitches in to help him. They become fast friends who desperately break the rules and the lines so they can get aboard a transport. Cheekily, they seize a stretcher case awaiting transport and dash to an embarkation station. They reach the ship at the last minute, but they are sent packing because they weren’t Red Cross personnel. Nolan has these two heading off to find passage elsewhere by any means whatever. Their exploits turn into shenanigans as they deal with one setback after another, even after they stow aboard a ship.

Although the RAF lost fewer planes than the Luftwaffe: 145 to 156, "Dunkirk" shows no more than six Spitfire fighters cruising the English Channel in search of prey. Again, budgetary concerns may explain the aircraft shortages. Also, Nolan doesn't go for too much CGI, so he resorted to cardboard cutouts of troops on the beach. Nevertheless, we get one hour's worth of the RAF giving the Luftwaffe utter Hell. Predictably, one pilot perishes in a crash, another ditches in the sea, but the third is far more fortunate. RAF pilot Farrier (Tom Hardy of "Mad Max: Fury Road") riddles repeatedly the Luftwaffe in "Dunkirk's" most exciting scenes. Christopher Nolan does a decent job of staging several tense scenes of soldiers confronting catastrophe. Unfortunately, apart from Tom Hardy's RAF pilot, Kenneth Blangah’s Naval officer (rarely endangered), Mark Rylance as an intrepid civilian sailor, and Cillian Murphy as a shell-shocked soldier, celebrity movie stars of prominence are far and few between in this epic. Indeed, most of the actors are unknown, except perhaps for "One-Direction" singer Harry Styles. Suspense works best when a character is conspicuous enough either as an actor or as a character for us to care about. Everybody is virtually a nobody in "Dunkirk." Meantime, evoking sympathy for soldiers so desperate that they take refuge in a beached ship and become targets seems like the province of a horror chiller. Quoting the cliché, they die like fish in a barrel during target practice. Indeed, two of the soldiers trapped in the boat are the same duo who have tried to bluff their way board a Red Cross ship. Oscar winning actor Mark Rylance has one of the better roles as a small boat owner who has already lost a son in the RAF. The episode with the shell-shocked soldier involving the inconsequential treatment of a civilian teen is the least savory scene. Nevertheless, Rylance's character is never in jeopardy. Often wearing an aviator's oxygen mask, Tom Hardy looks like the villainous Bane from Nolan's "The Dark Knight Rises," but he comes closest to being a blood and guts hero. Ultimately, despite its heartfelt tribute to British resiliency in the face of annihilation, "Dunkirk" qualifies as a fair war movie.

FILM REVIEW OF ''BATTLESHIP" (2012)

Anything can happen in science fiction.  The $200-million, sci-fi spectacle “Battleship” (**1/2 OUT OF ****) is as implausible as it is predictable.  Nevertheless, despite its contrivance and familiarity, this outlandish, larger-than-life, PG-13 rated, juvenile extravaganza will keep you entertained for most of its lengthy 131 minutes.  The anemic end credits scene isn’t worth waiting around for but it does assure us about the prospect of a sequel.  If you accept the proposition that pugnacious aliens from another galaxy would attack Earth, then none of “Battleship” is far-fetched.  The chief problem is predictability.  “Battleship” is a contemporary “War of the Worlds” knock-off set on the high seas.  Of course, the U.S. Navy defeats these hostile extraterrestrials, with a little help from a former Asian adversary.  “Friday Night Lights” director Peter Berg rehabilitates the Japanese for “Battleship.”  A Japanese naval officer figures out how to locate the aliens after the heroes lose radar.  An attractive cast, scenic Hawaiian settings, and the theme of diversity make “Battleship” rewarding for those who thrive on this brand of cheesy Saturday morning flotsam.  Anybody who knows anything about ships knows you couldn’t execute the maneuvers that the U.S.S. Missouri pulls off.  The fantastic Industrial Light and Magic’s computer-generated imagery compensates considerably for the corny, formulaic plot.   The alien warships are impressive, and one of their weapons—a blazing yo-yo that can eat through metal like a blow torch through butter--makes things appear dire.  Neither Liam Neeson nor pop singer Rihanna are given enough screen time to make much of an impression.

“Red” scribes Jon and Erich Hoeber along with Berg deserve top marks for their imaginative adaptation of the venerable Milton Bradley board game.  For the record, this two person game predates World War I and the opponents must guess the location of their enemy’s ships.  The Hoebers open “Battleship” in 2005 with the revelation that NASA (keep those funds coming) has found a "Goldilocks planet" similar to Earth in a nearby galaxy.  We use a powerful, sophisticated satellite to beam a radio signal to Planet G.  One geeky scientist raises questions about this strategy. "This could be like Columbus and the Indians, except we're the Indians.”  Predictably, these dastardly devils dispatch a reconnaissance force to investigate Earth.  Unfortunately, for these fellows who all resemble “Hellboy’s” Ron Pearlman with reptilian eyes, things do not proceed as planned.  Five ships invade Earth.  One smashes into an orbiting satellite and crashes into the skyscrapers of Hong Kong.  Now, the aliens have no way to call home.  The remaining four starships plunge into the Pacific Ocean. This occurs about the same time that the U.S. Navy and 13 other countries are embarking on RIMPAC.  Otherwise known as the Rim of the Pacific Naval Exercise, this bi-annual war games constitutes the world's largest international maritime task.  You can see how the Hoebers and Berg used the board game as a jumping off point. 

The first flaw afflicting “Battleship” is its bland humans.  Alex Hopper (Taylor Kitsch of “John Carter”) qualifies as the usual underdog hero.  Basically, Alex sleeps on his brother’s couch and mooches off him.  He gets into trouble on his 26^th birthday when he befriends a drop-dead gorgeous blonde, Samantha Shane (Brooklyn Decker of “Just Go with It”), at a bar.  An obnoxious barkeeper informs Samantha, as he shuts the door to a microwave, that the kitchen is closed.  Alex sidles up to our heroine and promises to deliver a chicken burrito in five minutes.  Initially, Alex discovers the convenience store across the street has just closed for the evening.  Resourceful fellow that Alex is, he breaks into the store, snatches a chicken burrito, nukes it, leaves money for it on the counter, and then makes a less-than-graceful exit.  Berg depicts these tongue-in-cheek antics from the perspective of the store’s surveillance cameras with Henry Mancini’s “Pink Panther” theme accentuating the humor.  The Honolulu Police taser Alex twice for his gallantry.  Naturally, Alex’s older brother Stone Hopper (Alexander Skarsgard of “Straw Dogs.”) isn’t amused.  Stone wants to join the Navy.  The revelation that Samantha is the daughter of U.S. Navy Pacific Fleet Commander Admiral Shane (Liam Neeson of “The Grey”) infuriates Stone.  Consequently, Stone coerces Alex to join the Navy, too.  

Seven years elapse. Stone commands the USS Sampson, while Alex serves as Tactical Action Officer aboard the destroyer USS John Paul Jones.  Samantha and Alex are still dating, much to Admiral Shane’s chagrin.  During a soccer match between the U.S. Navy and the Japanese, a Japanese player kicks Alex in the face by accident.  Long story short, this mischief forges bad blood between the two, and they tangle later and are reprimanded.  Admiral Shane warns Alex that his seagoing days may be numbered.  Cue the aliens to crash into the Pacific, wipe out a warship, and deploy an impregnable shield that encloses both the Sampson and the John Paul Jones.  Worse things ensue, but our hero redeems himself. 

The second flaw is the aliens aren’t as scary as their counterparts either in “Alien” or “Predator.”  These look-alike Mighty Morphin Power Rangers neither bleed sulfuric acid nor are they half as aggressive as the arachnids in “Starship Troopers.”  They boast some top-notch equipment, but their arsenal looks suspiciously similar to our Navy.  Mind you, these extraterrestrials are light years ahead of us in space travel and firepower.  Their massive, chrome-plated, shape-shifting, aerodynamic vessels come armed with the equivalent of hedgehop ordnance to rain down destruction on their adversaries.  Meantime, the U.S. Navy responds with their standard weapons and defeat the enemy because our heroes correctly guess where the aliens are.  The trailers make “Battleship” look like “Transformers” on water, but the aliens amount to far less intimidating adversaries with an Achilles’ heel that sinks them.  These aliens don’t bother to introduce themselves like the invaders in “The Day The Earth Stood Still” movies.  They present mankind with no ultimatums.  Indeed, they never talk.  

Vulnerable alien invaders, stereotypical human heroes, and predictible scripting nearly torpedo “Battleship.”  

FILM REVIEW OF "MCQ" (1974)

Initially, prominent Hollywood action director John Sturges and leading man John Wayne had planned to make "The Sons of Katie Elder." Wayne's declining health, however, prevented them from collaborating on that superb western that Henry Hathaway eventually helmed. Instead, Sturges and Wayne got together to make the urban police thriller "McQ," and "McQ" (***1/2 out of ****) ranks as one of the best of the modern-day police thrillers in the tradition of both "Bullitt" and "Dirty Harry." The Lawrence Roman screenplay, inspired by Roman's previous epic "Slaughter on 10th Avenue," is top-notch stuff with a genuine mystery attached to an otherwise highly serviceable thriller about a rogue cop. Veteran detective Lon McQ (John Wayne) has a vendetta to settle with the chief villain, Manuel Santiago, and McQ believes that Santiago put out a contract on his partner Stan Boyle. Yes, this formulaic plot is as creaky as "The Maltese Falcon," but Sturges and Wayne always pay off in spades.

This atmospheric actioneer is worth watching for several reasons. First, cinematographer Harry Straddling, Jr. lensed a really cool, careening auto chase across scenic Seattle. Second, everybody has memorable lines of dialogue. Third, Elmer Bernstein delivers another thumping orchestral score. Fourth, Hal Needham staged the first ever tumbling cinematic car stunt on the beach at the end. Fifth, John Wayne gets to wield the rapid-firing MAC-10 submachine gun in its motion picture debut. "Lon, it's not licensed," the firearms guy reminds him. "Jack," McQ replies, "neither am I." Remember Dirty Harry had his .44 magnum, so Wayne winds up with a variation on his old "Stagecoach" repeater. Sixth, Eddie Albert, despite one sudden haircut goof in an interrogation scene, stands out as McQ's fire-eating superior Ed Kosterman who blames everything on 'radicals.' Kosterman keeps his eyes glued on McQ from start to finish. Eventually, Kosterman assigns a cop, J.C. (Jim Watkins of "Cool Breeze") to shadow McQ because McQ has a history of police brutality. McQ is a "Die Hard" type cop. He does what he needs to so he can get what it wants. It's not often that you see John Wayne play a character who intentioned lies. Western television star Clu Gulager is on hand, too, in a first-class cast that includes "McCloud's" girlfriend Diana Muldaur, perennial tough guy villain Al Lettieri, Colleen Dewhurst, Julie Adams, and portly David Huddleston.

The complex plot opens with McQ's long-time partner Stan Boyle (William Bryant of "The Guns of Will Sonnet") putting three bullets each into two uniformed cops during the early morning breakfast hours. What McQ doesn't know is that Boyle is the one did the killing. Boyle doesn't give either man a chance to return fire. Later, at a rendezvous outside of a coffee shop, Boyle hands his murder weapon, a 9MM automatic pistol with a silencer, over to the mystery man who lets him have it with a shotgun blast in the back. The mystery arises over who did the killings. Captain Kostermann (Eddie Albert of "Roman Holiday") insists that radicals are behind these murders. Predictably, McQ believes that his arch nemesis Santiago (Al Letierri of "The Godfather")is to blame. As it turns out, Kostermann and McQ are both wrong!

Meantime, McQ wants Kostermann to assign him to Stan's case. "Personal involvement clouds clear judgement," say Kostermann and refuses to put in on the case. Kostermann reminds McQ about an incident in the past. "Lon, I know you. I'm not gonna stand for you making up your own rules. You're not going to pull that Mickey Peters thing again!" McQ is adamant. "Peters was a hood and everybody knew it!" Kostermann reminds him what happened to Peters. "Yeah, and you weren't satisfied with throwing him up on the roof! You had to go up there and throw him back down! Six months in the hospital! Four lawyers screaming about his civil rights!" McQ replies without flinching: "Well, it kept him off the streets, didn't it?" 

 Nevertheless, this doesn't keep McQ from making a complete ass of himself as he stakes out Santiago's premises. A tip from a black pimp, Rosey (Roger E. Mosley of "Leadbelly"), provides him with information about a team of gunmen that Santiago has imported. McQ also learns about two million dollars in cocaine and heroin that is scheduled for incineration at an undisclosed location. He follows it to a local hospital, has a mild run-in with a security guard, and then catches Santiago's men after they have stolen the drugs and are wheeling it out the door in a laundry cart. Just as McQ catches onto them, they blast away at him and scramble out of the parking lot in a laundry truck. McQ pursues in his sporty car and takes several short cuts across Seattle to catch up to the truck. Ironically, the minute that he catches up with the laundry truck, another laundry truck that is identical to the one McQ is following cruises into traffic. Now, McQ has two laundry trucks in front of him. One truck careens out of traffic and McQ tags it. He cuts the truck off and pulls it over. As it turns out, McQ stopped the wrong truck!!!

Nothing is a picnic for our hero. Later, he is trying to pull out of an alley and two 18-wheel tractor-trailer rigs box him in and slam repeatedly into his Green Hornet until it is a shambles and he is squished up in it. The villains, it seems, have been trying to separate McQ from his car since the outset when a car thief tried to swipe his car at the marina. No sooner has McQ left the Seattle P.D. than he persuades a local private eye, Pinky (David Huddleston of "Bad Company"), to help him get a P.I. license so he can take advantage of Pinky's cover. "I see it, do-it-yourself gumshoe," Pinky observes.

John Sturges, who helmed "The Magnificent Seven," "The Great Escape," and "The Satan Bug" maintains the suspense and tension throughout this 111 minute thriller and sets up one primary red herring in the Roman screenplay that pays off in the finale. Mind you, "McQ" is no "Dirty Harry." It doesn't address the legal complications of our flawed justice system, and the chief villain is a corporate type drug smuggler with a large company that he can hide behind as well as an expensive attorney who doesn't miss a trick.


Sure, John Wayne looks a mite long in the tooth to be playing such an athletic role, but he carries himself well enough and he has a genuine character to play. Incidentally, Wayne had a chance to play "Dirty Harry," but he turned it down. He doesn't have a bank robbery scene like Clint did in "Dirty Harry," but he has a scene where he nails a fleeing hit-man named Patty Samuels dead in his tracks on a Seattle dock with a well-nigh impossible shot. "That was the greatest shot," raves a dock hand, "that I ever saw." Interestingly, this scene resembles a scene from Sturges' "The Magnificent Seven" where Brett (James Coburn) fired at a man on horse just as the rider reached the skyline. Brett blew the horseman out of the saddle. Chico rhapsodizes about the shot, but Brett explains that he was aiming for the horse but not the rider!

"McQ" is an above-average thriller that every John Wayne fan must see!

An excellent book to peruse if you are interested in John Sturges, his life, and his films is Glen Lovell's top-notch biography on Sturges entitled "Escape Artist: The Life and Films of John Sturges." Mr. Lovell spent 10 years writing and researching this seminal text about Sturges.

FILM REVIEW OF "THE RETURN OF DRACULA" (1958)

No,"Square Dance Jubilee" director Paul Landres' "The Return of Dracula" (*** out ****) has nothing to do with either the Universal Pictures franchise or the Hammer Film series. Instead, United Artists distributed this Gramercy Pictures theatrical release, and "The Return of Dracula" qualifies as an imaginative but minor chiller on a low budget. Landres and scenarist Pat Fielder, who collaborated earlier on the lackluster movie "The Vampire," have taken liberties with the formulaic Bram Stoker story while channeling the Alfred Hitchcock serial killer thriller "Shadow of a Doubt" as an American family opens their doors to the infamous Count who is masquerading as their immigrant cousin. Surprisingly, the filmmakers do not acknowledge Stoker during the opening credits, though the name of Stoker’s memorable vampire is mentioned three times. Dracula rides in a contemporary train at one point and later crosses the Atlantic Ocean on a luxury liner. This is the kind of vampire movie where the undead one can freely enter any rooms without an invitation. Some vampire lore dictates that the vampire cannot enter a room without the permission of its host. One of the neatest things about this micro-budget effort is the use of dry ice inside the coffins when we gaze upon the vampires.

“The Return of Dracula” opens with the following narration as two cars cruise through the countryside in route to a cemetery: “It is a known fact that there existed in Central Europe a Count Dracula. Though human in appearance and cultured in manner, he was, in truth, a thing undead, a force of evil, a vampire feeding on the blood of innocent people, he turned them into his own kind, thus spreading his evil domination even wider. The attempts to find and destroy this evil were never proven completely successful. And so the search continues to this very day.” Like Bram Stoker’s novel, “The Return of Dracula” finds our undead protagonist looking for somewhere different to stalk his prey. Several men led by John Merriman (John Wengraf of “The Pride and the Passion”) climb out of the two cars, drape pedants with crosses at their throats, and enter Dracula’s tomb to kill him. Imagine their surprise when they find an empty coffin! The action shifts to a railway station as Bellac Gordal (Norbert Schiller of “Sign of the Pagan”) explains that living in the Balkans stifles his artistic freedom, so he bids his immediate family farewell to board a train to America. Bellac plans to stay with his cousin, Cora Mayberry (Greta Granstedt of “Nocturne”), and her family in Carleton, California. Fortunately for Dracula, Cora hasn’t laid eyes on her Bellac since he was a little boy. When Bellac enters his coach, the artist meets a mysterious gentleman perusing a Berlin newspaper. Not long after he puts his luggage in an upper berth, Bellac turns to the other passenger. A look of horror suffuses Bellac’s face the man assaults him. Director Paul Landres edits Bellac’s death scene so when Bellac screams, the action cuts to an exterior shot of the locomotive as its eldritch whistle pierces the night with a hair-raising shriek, the perfect visual and aural metaphor for Bellac’s terror. What makes this set-up so interesting is that Dracula later confides to Cora’s daughter Rachel (Norma Eberhardt of “Live Fast, Die Young”) that he left Central Europe because he felt that “My life has been confined. That’s why I came here . . . for freedom. I must have it.” These lines of dialogue make “The Return of Dracula” a Cold War era vampire chiller. Unmistakably, the Count is bailing out of the Balkans because of Communism.

Of course, the Mayberry family is anxious to welcome cousin Bellac and make him as comfortable as possible. Nobody is more excited to see her cousin than Rachel. Rachel wants to be an artist like Bellac, but she fears that she will end up working as a nurse. She spends time already in a nearby religious facility that takes care of sick people. She tends a blind girl, Jennie Blake (Virginia Vincent of “Tony Rome”), at the parish house and reads to her. Initially, the Mayberry’s aren’t sure how to treat their cousin. He rarely comes out of his room during the day and he detests mirrors. Dracula goes after Jennie and makes her his bride. Before she goes to school the next day, Rachel is summoned to parish house and watches in horror as Jennie dies. Jennie slips her the crucifix before she dies. A U.S. Department of Immigration official, Mack Bryant (Charles Tannen of “The Rack”), shows up at the Mayberry house and makes inquiries about Bellac. He explains that a man was thrown from a train in Europe when a group of immigrants were making their way to America. Dracula appears to answer Bryant’s questions. Bryant wields a cleverly concealed camera in a flip-top cigarette lighter. He ignites his cigarette as he snaps a photo.

Bryant is cooperating with Merriman, and Dracula suspects as much so he kills Bryant after Jennie Blake lures the poor fellow into the woods. The cool thing about this Dracula movie is that nobody actually kills the evil Count. Dracula lures Rachel to the secluded cave where he has concealed his coffin. This is the same cave that Rachel’s little brother Tim followed his cat Nugget. Eventually, the cat died in the cave. Meanwhile Merriman has mobilized the town authorities to kill Jennie. Everybody is flabbergasted when they see Jennie sneak back into her crypt at sunrise. Merriman and company open the coffin and drive the stake into her. The close-up of the stake going into Jennie’s body was photographed in color. No sooner has the stake penetrated her evil heart and killed her than Dracula feels the impact of the stake itself and staggers against his own coffin. Rachel makes a break for it and encounters her boyfriend Tim (Ray Stricklyn of “The Last Wagon”) who takes her crucifix and holds it up at Dracula. He forces the Count to back away from Rachel. Dracula concentrates so much on Tim and the crucifix that he forgets about a pit behind and falls into it, and skewers himself on a stake. He turns into a skeleton and perishes.

Francis Lederer makes an effectively villainous Dracula with a conspicuous foreign accent, but he cannot bare his fangs any more than his predecessors could. Indeed, nobody ever addresses him as Dracula to his face, and he has no crazy mad assistant. He hails from the Balkans area of eastern Europe. He doesn't dress as fashionably as either Bela Lugosi or Christopher Lee, but he is not a derelict. He likes to materialize out of a cloud of mist and the same is true of the poor girl that he transforms into his vampire bride. This Dracula is also shape-shifter, and he appears as a white wolf but there is no transformation scene. Although “Isle of the Dead” lenser Jack Mackenzie photographed the film predominantly in black and white, Landres inserts an interesting shot that is in color when our heroes stake a vampire. The last-minute ending is quite ironic, too! Not long after the May 1958 release of "The Return of Dracula," Hammer Film Studios released their "Horror of Dracula" the following May that took the infamous vampire to a new level of excitement. Christopher Lee was allowed to bare his fangs!

FILM REVIEW OF ''BETWEEN HEAVEN AND HELL" (1956)

“Violent Saturday” director Richard Fleischer’s explosive, bullet-riddled epic “Between Heaven & Hell” combines the plot about clashes between subordinates and their superior officers set against the backdrop of World War II combat in the Pacific with the problem melodrama about Old and New South social consciousness. Robert Wagner starts out as an elitist, bourbon & branch water swilling, Southern cotton gin operator who displays no sympathy for his poor sharecroppers. Before this sturdy 94-minute, Cinemascope movie fades out, the protagonist turns over a new leaf and becomes a more considerate individual who is concerned about the welfare of his workers. The clash between officers in Fleischer’s film reached the screen a mere six days before director Robert Aldritch’s cynical wartime thriller “Attack.” “Between Heaven and Hell” came out October 11, 1956, while “Attack” debuted October 17, 1956. Nevertheless, “Attack” ranks as a more compelling outing because Robert Wagner’s NCO doesn’t kill the pusillanimous officer, while Lt. Harold 'Harry' Woodruff (William Smithers) in “Attack” kills a cowardly officer. Interestingly enough, Buddy Ebsen appeared in both movies as a G.I. Unlike “Attack,” “Between Heaven and Hell” confronts the issue of inequity between poor whites and affluent whites in the Old South. Actually, “Attack” surpasses “Between Heaven and Hell,” but the latter picture adds weight to the trend in American World War II movies about clashes between commanders and subordinates. Like the Aldritch film, “Between Heaven and Hell” painted an unsavory portrait of life in the military that showed American soldiers with feet of clay that films such as “The Naked and the Dead,” “Tarawa Beachhead” and “The Victors” would build on in later years.

The Fleischer film opens with two soldiers escorting Private Sam Francis Gifford (Robert Wagner of “Titanic”) to see Lieutenant Colonel Miles (Frank Gerstle of “D.O.A”) about a disciplinary problem. The military authorities have arrested Sam for attempting to kill a superior officer, Lieutenant Ray Mosby (Tod Andrews of “In Harm’s Way”), who ironically was one of his closest drinking buddies before the war broke out. Matters are complicated somewhat because Sam has received a Silver Star for dangling himself off the side of a cliff to sling explosives into a Japanese machine gun emplacement in a cave, a setting that suggests that this exploit occurred on Guadalcanal. Since Sam has won the medal, Miles prefers to send him to serve with George Company rather than imprison him in Leavenworth. The grim dialogue between Sam and the driver of the jeep, Private Willie Crawford (Buddy Ebsen of “Parachute Battalion”) suggests that prison would be preferable. Crawford observes as he hands his M-1 rifle to Sam. “Go ahead and kill someone, I don't care. How did you get in this outfit?" Sam replies without enthusiasm, "It was that or Leavenworth." Crawford shrugs, "Shoulda taken Leavenworth."

Sam meets his new superior officer, Captain 'Waco' Grimes, Commanding Officer, who stipulates that nobody can call him by his rank. Waco dreads that a Japanese sniper will kill him, so he insists that nobody refer to him by his rank. Waco keeps two Thompson machine-gun wielding soldiers at his sides at all times, Private. Swanson (Skip Homeier of “The Gunfighter”) and Private Millard (Frank Gorshin of “Batman”), and they wear only t-shirts on this upper chests rather than proper combat fatigues. Waco makes Sam his radio operator and Sam leaves to wander the new camp. He stretches out on the ground after Waco dismisses him and stares into a mud hole. The surface of the mud hole ripples when Sam tosses a pebble in it and the film shifts into flashback mode some 15 minutes into the action to take us back before Pearl Harbor to the South when Sam was a heartless but well-heeled cotton gin operator who had married Jenny (Terry Moore of “Mighty Joe Young”) and they were living high off the hog. We learn that Jenny’s father, Colonel Cousins (Robert Keith of “Branded”), commands Sam’s National Guard outfit and organizes it to mobilize overseas.

Before his call to duty after Pearl Harbor, Sam reprimands the laziness of his sharecroppers and treats them like dirt. Sam becomes buddies up with several G.I.s, and they become fast friends, foremost a down-to-earth country boy named Private Crawford. They really bond when Pvt. Bernard "Bernie" Meleski (Harvey Lembeck of “Stalag 17”) pretends that he is an officer to obtain two case of beer. Lieutenant Mosby sends Sam and his friends in to check out a village. The sight of a snake sends a chill down Mosby’s spine. Caught up short by a case of frayed nerves, Mosby accidentally fires the machine gun after Meleski knocks down a porch awning. The sight of watching Meleski and his friends getting mowed down propels Sam headlong toward Mosby. He clobbers the lieutenant with his rifle butt and ends up behind the stockade.

According to the American Film Institute, John Sturges was scheduled to helm it. Guy Madison was up for the Robert Wagner role and Twentieth Century Fox contract actress Joan Collins was considered for the role that Terry Moore inherited. “Between Heaven and Hell” suffers minimally from the usual idiocy that afflicts many Hollywood World War II movies. Specifically, American officers wear their rank on the front of their helmets—rather than the rear--making him easy for vigilant Japanese snipers. Unlike most World War II movies, an officer here who dons his helmet with his rank prominently on show dies from a sharpshooting enemy marksman. Top-notch photography by “The Day the Earth Stood Still” lenser Leo Tover gives “Between Heaven and Hell” a sprawling, virile appearance, that belies its actual location at the Twentieth Century-Fox ranch in the Santa Monica Mountains, while “Dead Reckoning” composer Hugo Friedhofer received an Academy Award nomination for his orchestral score. Fleischer conjures up commendable suspense and excitement primarily with the standard theme of friendship; soldiers who buddy up suddenly have to confront the loss of their new-found friends. Meanwhile, this above-average combat opus boasts a cast of first-class thespians that includes Broderick Crawford, Buddy Ebsen, Brad Dexter, Ken Clark, Frank Gorshin, Skip Homeier, and Harvey Lembeck. Fleischer and “D-Day, The Sixth of June” & “A Walk in the Sun” scenarist Harry Brown, who adapted Arkansas-born novelist Francis Gwaltney’s 1955 fiction book “The Day the Century Ended,” give their military fans more than enough firefights to past muster. Interestingly, Rod Serling tried without success to adapt the Gwaltney novel. Moreover, Gwaltney was a Pacific campaign veteran. Fleischer refrains from demonizing the Japanese and presents them as an impersonal but dangerous enemy.