World War Two – Page 3 – The Magnificent 60s

Hornets Nest (1970) ****

Given exceedingly short shrift in its day. Viewed as in exceptionally poor taste. Marketed in some respects as Lord of the Flies Meets The Dirty Dozen. Audiences accepting of kids putting on a show or, the modern equivalent, making a movie, not so keen on youngsters going to war. In any case there’s an inbuilt repugnance as you get the distinct impression some of these kids would have been ideal recruits for Hitler Youth or the Mussolini version. And Italy, one-time ally of Hitler, becoming suddenly heroic seemed to jibe. Not to mention Rock Hudson’s marquee value fading fast after a gigantic turkey called Darling Lili (1969). Despite some distinctly unsavory aspects, bordering on exploitation, this seems enormously underrated, not just as an actioner, but for a raw depiction of war, far more realistic than many in the genre that toplined on violence.

Sure, it’s an odd concept, Italian kids, in the absence of adults, turned into a fighting force by dint of letting loose their innate venality and savagery. But they’ve not been washed up, adult-free, on a desert island. This small bunch have been orphaned and bloodily. Germans on the hunt for local partisans execute an entire village and then, finding a quisling, proceed to massacre the local resistance and for good measure destroy a team of American parachutists dropped into the area to facilitate the Allied advance.

The kids come across the one survivor, Turner (Rock Hudson), hide him from the enemy and dupe German doctor Bianca (Sylva Koscina), sympathetic to the plight of the innocent, into caring for the wounded soldier. Rather than hang around and accept the ministrations of such a beauty and see out the war with a view to possible romance, Turner is intent on single-handedly completing his mission of blowing up a dam.

Given the kids have amassed a secret armory and are trigger-happy, desperate to avenge their parents, and getting down to the gung-ho aspects of war, Turner, with appalling disregard for their safety, decides to commandeer them for his own unit. Bianca objects and watches with horror and for most of the rest of the picture confines herself to the pair too young to be considered combatants and who reek of desolation or to find ways of killing Turner or betraying him to the Germans.

Meanwhile, the kids have their own ruthless leader, Aldo (Mark Colleano), one part John Wayne, one part the creepy Maggott (Telly Savalas in case you’ve forgotten) from The Dirty Dozen, who objects to taking orders. Training consists of little more than a bit of marching in file and learning how to quickly reload a machine gun. Turner’s clever plan is to use their perceived innocence to distract the Germans guarding the dam. The distraught Bianca, stepping out of line once too often, is raped for her trouble.

*Oddly enough, Koscina does take a machine gun to the Germans, which you would have thought would be catnip to the marketeers, but that image is excluded from the poster.*

Setting aside all audience misgivings about the premise and the sexual undertones, the mission is very well done, plenty tension, a workable plan, and the eventual dam-burst impressive on the budget.

But the misgivings are not glossed over. There’s a dicey moment when it looks as if the kids, crawling all over the nurse, tearing off her clothes, are about to embark on mass juvenile rape. And the bloodlust will only be slaked when, by dint of secreting the detonators essential to the plan, they force Turner to lead them on a raid on the Germans, tossing hand grenades into houses and opening fire from the back of a truck on the unsuspecting enemy.

Aldo, in particular, gets a taste for killing and in a later battle doesn’t hold back when one of his comrades inadvertently gets in his way.

Sold as a junior edition of a mission picture, the trailer would have probably been enough to put off large sections of the audience, uncomfortable with kids being employed in such mercenary fashion. Kids grow up in war but not that fast seemed to be the general reaction. Okay if they’re portrayed as victims, less acceptable as gun-happy butchers.

So, the best elements of the movie is in not avoiding such misgivings. It was soon clear from the American experience – though this is not specifically alluded to – that hordes of kids in Vietnam were going down this route. The point at which kids cross over into bloody adulthood and lose the essence of childhood is dealt with too. That scene on the face of it and in isolation appears maudlin but in the context of the picture works very well. But the violence or its aftermath are not the most striking images. Again and again, the camera returns to the dirty, clothes-tattered, Bianca clutching the two infants, the detritus of conflict.

Setting aside his moustachioed muscle, Rock Hudson (Seconds, 1966) gives a well-judged performance and Sylva Koscina (A Lovely Way To Die, 1968), shorn of glamor, holds the emotional center. Mark Colleano (The Boys of Paul St, 1968) gives a vicious impression of a young hood on the rise. Directed by sometime cult director Phil Karlson (A Time for Killing, 1967) from a script by S.S. Schweitzer (Change of Habit, 1969) and producer Stanley Colbert. Great score from Ennio Morricone.

It’s worth pointing out that the idea of kids taking up arms received positive critical approval when it was applied to such an arthouse darling as If… (1969) but of course they were public schoolboys forced into action by bad teachers and in reaction to “the establishment” and not after seeing their families slaughtered. Double standards, methinks.

Worth reassessment.

The Wackiest Ship in the Army (1960) ***

A more misleading title would be hard to find – and that goes for the posters too. This is a misfit movie – a bunch of raw recruits knocked into shape by an unwilling captain tasked with sailing a ship into a South Pacific war zone in WWII. Admittedly, Jack Lemmon is in exasperated double-take default in the opening section, but it quickly shifts from comedy to drama as Lemmon shepherds his inexperienced crew into a more compact team.

Screenwriter Frank Murphy has an exceptionally good portfolio – Panic in the Streets (1950), The Desert Rats (1953), Broken Lance (1954) and Compulsion (1959) – but brings less to the table as a director, this only his second – and final – outing in that capacity. But given he is directing from his own screenplay, he must take the blame for the incongruous hybrid. Add in an unnecessary tune from Ricky Nelson and the briefest of brief romances and no wonder it’s hard to make head or tail of the movie until it does eventually head out to sea.

Once Lemmon is given more to do than shake or scratch his head the picture moves into more satisfactory territory. Instead of dismissing the crew as idiots, he takes command and shows dramatic chops that are a hint of things to come (Days of Wine and Roses just two pictures away) when he sloughed off comedy for more serious undertakings.

Reason for Lemmon being assigned this motorized sailing ship rather than something more obviously U.S. Navy is that he is in the last chance saloon. Once under sail, setting aside some dodgy process work, and it becomes clear they are heading into harm’s way rather than simply delivering the boat to General MacArthur in more harmless waters, the story switches into perilous wartime perilous adventure with decent battle, a couple of twists and some dramatic confrontation.

Lemmon is always watchable, and I always thought he could have done with more self-belief when it came to tackling more dramatic parts. When he goes ramrod-stiff and starts barking out orders and has to out-maneuver superiors and enemy, he is entirely convincing, as, too, safeguarding his charges or rescuing them and leading them in battle. Setting aside the need for Nelson to register his credentials as a singer, he is not bad either, as an ensign making his way, an ingenue role that suits this ingenue.

Veteran John Lund (My Friend Irma) appears as a crusty, wide admiral and Chips Rafferty, the only Australian actor anybody had ever heard of at that point outside of Rod Taylor, has a cameo. Irishwoman Patricia O’Driscoll manages a passable Aussie accent as the brief romancer, her role mostly confined to looks of longing while Lemmon is at sea. Raspy-voiced Mike Kellin as an out-of-his-depth chief mate turned up in the television series based on the picture. If ever there was a film of two halves (well, one-third and two-thirds) it’s this, but the second section passes muster.

Not quite shipshape but getting there.

The Gallant Hours (1960) ***

A curiosity. Something of vanity project for star James Cagney (One, Two, Three, 1961) – in his penultimate leading role – who doubled up as producer. But more of a documentary than a war picture. Witness, no scenes of actual World War II combat for a start. And going down the same annoying route as The St Valentine’s Day Massacre (1967) where the voice-over pretty much tells you what everyone had for breakfast and in that vein goes on to tell you whether or not they survived the conflict and maybe became a relatively famous politician thereafter.

Basically recounts the turnaround in U.S. fortunes at the Battle of Guadalcanal in the South Pacific in 1942-1943. The Americans had invaded the island but were coming under increasing pressure from the Japanese. In case you don’t know your Second World War history, this was the first major American land offensive following Pearl Harbor. Though the Americans had thwarted the Japanese at The Battle of the Coral Sea and the Battle of Midway, these were nautical triumphs. Guadalcanal was the first objective in the American island-hopping strategy.

Here, I’m getting all information-overload myself, because all you really need to know is that the Americans parachuted in (actually, he landed by flying boat) Admiral “Bull” Halsey (James Cagney) at a critical moment to revitalize their operation and prevent the expected Japanese attack. The Japanese were so convinced that victory was imminent that they had drawn up operational details of the surrender ceremony they planned to impose on the vanquished Americans.

The Yanks managed to intercept and decode Japanese radio transmissions and in the only real dramatic moment, after capturing the surrender document, Halsey pins it to a tree so his troops can read it and stiffen their resolve.

But mostly this is a bunch of guys in a bunch of rooms talking about what they were going to do and how difficult, what with lack of support and casualties and low morale, their challenge was going to be. There’s no shortage of detail but every time a scene starts to become dramatically interesting up pops our resident voiceover (director and co-star Robert Montgomery if you want to know) to provide us with some unnecessary detail about some character in the room.

On the debit side, this is pretty irritating. On the plus side, it’s fascinating, a potted history of various personnel without having to resort to the usual sub-plots, often inane in themselves, often of the romantic persuasion, that crop up in an otherwise intriguing war picture so as to provide the audience with people to root for. If you were American, you would recognise some of the characters depicted, some true-life heroes (ace pilots, courageous soldiers) who made their name on the field of battle or contributed to the victory off it.

Of course, if you’re from anywhere else you won’t have a clue who anybody is – and not that much interested either, preferring the old-fashioned approach of sub-plot and romance – but stick with it because, once you realize this is a determinedly novel approach for the genre, it does become pretty interesting especially as Cagney, despite his character being nicknamed “Bull,” dispenses with his usual acting tricks, the strangulated voice and the aggressive demeanor, in favor of a more rounded personality.

Nobody tends to hold up a critical mirror to battles that end in victory, unlike Pearl Harbor, so it’s never going to degenerate into verbal fisticuffs, and much of the pressure the audience might detect comes from the other side, the cocky Japanese, who are presented in a very even-handed manner, despite, or perhaps because, their leader Admiral Yamamoto (James T. Goto), who led the attack on Pearl Harbor, was highly respected by the Americans. This is where maybe Violent City (1970) got the idea of ignoring subtitles, but at least here we can rely on Mr Voiceover to keep us posted on what the Japanese were actual up to.

Cagney holds it all together and you might spot Dennis Weaver (Duel, 1971) and Richard Jaeckal (The Dirty Dozen, 1967) among the supporting cast. Sixth and final directorial outing for star Robert Montgomery (though he limits his onscreen involvement here to just the narration) who had experimented with voiceover in Lady in the Lake (1945). Whether you fall in with his take on this one, he pretty much delivers what he intended, a semi-documentary account of leaders in battle. Screenplay by Beirne Lay Jr (The Young and the Brave, 1963) and Frank D. Gilroy (The Subject Was Roses, 1968).

Not compelling, but interesting enough.

633 Squadron (1964) ***

You can keep your current and future Oscar winners, George Chakiris (for West Side Story, 1961) and Cliff Robertson (for Charly, 1968). The stars here are the mechanical birds, the Mosquito bombers, and the Ron Goodwin score, a thundering rehearsal for Where Eagles Dare (1968).

The aerial photography was pretty amazing for the day, though there were no Top Gun: Maverick shenanigans with actors supposedly actually flying the planes, just sitting there with an occasional turn or yank of the controls. Even so, watching the planes take off, land, propellers describing perfect arcs, being attacked on ground or in the air, firing back, and the (apologies) bird’s eye view of dashes along precipitous cliffs takes up a huge amount of the running time.

You’ll know by now there was no actual 633 Squadron – but there was an international squadron (see the current Masters of the Air) to accommodate the various accents on show – and that the mission is also fictional, though the idea that the Germans had chosen the Norwegian fjords to hide a factory making rocket fuel for the V1s currently in production elsewhere wasn’t too far off the mark given (see The Heroes of Telemark, 1965) they were using that country for atomic bomb experiments.

The British know the rockets are inevitable, impossible to completely destroy them, but as long as they don’t interfere with D-Day that will be good enough. Wing Commander Grant (Cliff Robertson), although his squadron is exhausted from flying too many daily missions, has his leave curtailed, and told he’s on a strict deadline to destroy the factory.

Like the factory in The Heroes of Telemark, it’s virtually impossible to hit, buried beneath too much rock, but the Germans ain’t that clever, and it’s the rock that is the weakness. The theory is hit the overhang with sufficient bombs and the mountain will come tumbling down and destroy the factory.

Norwegian Resistance fighter Lt Bergman (George Chakiris) is on hand to explain just how difficult the task is, flying at extremely low altitude along fjords guarded by anti-aricraft guns. To add more tension, or just for the hell of it, Air Vice Marshal Davis (Harry Andrews) keeps on truncating the already tight deadline. The pilots have barely got time for a few practice runs along Scottish glens before it’s M-Day (no idea where that daft moniker came from, presumably a D-Day discard).

But there is just enough time for Grant to make pretty with Bergman’s refugee sister Hilde (Maria Perschy). Although after Bergman returns to help out his mates and is unhelpfully captured by the Nazis, Grant has to bomb the Gestapo building to kill him before he can be tortured and give out vital information.

In another film, Hilde would have been a spy or cut off the burgeoning romance after discovering Grant’s mission, but instead she’s not in the espionage line and she thanks the wing commander for sparing her brother torture. In the only major twist in the picture, it turns out Grant was too late, for there’s a nasty welcome committee awaiting the bombers.

Not quite the Boy’s Own derring-do adventure tale I remember, what with the torture and the climax, but it was still in my day one of the few films that appealed heart-and-soul to the pre-teen and teenage boy, along with The Magnificent Seven and The Great Escape, in part, I guess, because it was so thrifty in terms of character development.

No time is wasted giving everyone a character arc, beyond the usual daredevil and someone getting married, the characters are sketchy beyond belief, but who the hell cares, let’s get on with the action. So, it certainly delivers on that score. But watching as an adult, and I’ve probably not seen this in four decades, it’s a good bit tougher than the surface might suggest, eating away at the idealism of war, of the noble sacrifice, and tuning in better than most World War Two pictures to raw finality.

Perhaps it’s emblematic that the best cinematic introduction is given to the arrival of the new-style bombs, although Hilde turning up to a torrent of wolf whistles in the bar runs it close, and she does have a habit of leaning out a window to give the audience a glimpse of cleavage every now and then.

No wonder we all came out humming the Goodwin theme. You can’t escape it. It’s in virtually every scene. Memorable final line uttering by the air vice marshal, “You can’t kill a squadron.”

It would have set the bar high for aerial photography, except that by showing how it could be done, triggered a small flurry of similar pictures, most notably The Blue Max (1966) and The Battle of Britain (1969).

Walter Grauman (A Rage to Live, 1965) clearly adores the machines more than the humans, but the script by James Clavell (The Great Escape, 1963) and Howard Koch (The Fox, 1967) based on the novel by Frederick E. Smith doesn’t give him much option.

Still worth a watch.

Counterpoint (1968) ****

Absorbing duel of minds between two autocrats obsessed with their own glory and needs and dealing with dissension in the ranks. That it takes place during the Battle of the Bulge turns out to be less of a dramatic hindrance though you maybe have to suspend disbelief in the notion that any resistance fighters might take time out from trying to sabotage Germans to help rescue a bunch of whining, pampered non-combatants with no strategic value whatsoever.

Once you accept that the U.S.O. would deem a classical orchestra the best way to entertain the troops rather than Betty Grable or Bob Hope then you’re halfway there.

*Poster that misleadingly apes “The Great Escape” and “The Dirty Dozen”. Naturally, no woman would attempt such an escape without giving everyone a glimpse of cleavage.*

Anyway, the Germans launching an offensive in December 1944 by accident capture the classical orchestra led by world-famous conductor Lionel Evans (Charlton Heston). The Germans are under orders to take no prisoners so as not to divert vital troops during this last-stage effort to extend the war, so under the direction of Colonel Arndt (Anton Diffring) the musicians face a firing squad until General Schiller (Maximilian Schell) happens to pop his head out of his window and recognize his hero, Evans.

Death is temporarily averted while Schiller purrs over his captive. But Evans, still high on principle and arrogance, refuses to comply with Schiller’s request to play a concert for him during a delay in the battle as, the Germans, hit by fuel shortage, are unable to continue their campaign and therefore have time on their hands. There ensues the aforesaid duel of minds plus various demonstrations of disloyalty and ruthlessness.

The joy here is the dialog because there’s not much else going on, beyond a half-hearted attempt to escape, and the tension doesn’t rachet up until Evans realizes Schiller is only keeping them alive until the concert, after which they will be turned over to the trigger-happy Arndt, who lacking any subtlety, has already begun to dig a mass grave in full view of the trapped self-proclaimed neutrals.

*Teamed up in Britain with the long-lost “The Pink Jungle”, which, as it happens, I’m reviewing shortly.*

It’s almost a parade of bon mots as each of the leaders tries to top the other’s sentences, and not in merely a clever manner, but with full-blown fascinating argument, in part about the different outlooks of each country, but also about their contradictions, and it’s a rare movie that can hold your attention just through dialog unless it’s set in a courtroom. But, here, Evans isn’t so much arguing for the suspension of a death penalty, for example, but in a remote high-mindedness complaining that, well, there’s no other word for it, that it’s just “unfair” as if the Geneva Convention has a special clause regarding classical musicians.

Maybe it does, given these are Americans, though not in uniform, which might be a point in their favor. But any commander would be correct in assuming they could, through courageous action, perform an act of sabotage or at the very least, as I mentioned, tie up vital resources.

Matters are complicated because Arndt, less self-indulgent than his superior, goes behind Schiller’s back to rat him out to HQ in Berlin while nameless persons within the orchestra are clearly in cahoots with the Germans. And you can’t blame them either. Arndt believes Schiller’s actions could compromise the attack, the orchestra traitors that Evans’ defiance will get them all killed. Evans is quite happy to sacrifice former lover Annabelle (Kathryn Hays) to keep the German commander, who has taken a fancy to her, happy.

Matters are complicated by the presence in the orchestra ranks of two U.S. soldiers in uniform, who feel duty bound to find a way out, so there’s a bit of the kind of action you’d get in a heist movie where an audience listens to classical music while above them a cat burglar is divesting them of their jewels. Here, the two soldiers are clambering up the innards of a church to the roof to scope out the territory and then attempt escape using a home-made rope made up of scarves and nylons etc.

As it becomes obvious that there is no point in Evans playing for time, the tension and turmoil does increase as that unfilled mass grave beckons. Doesn’t play out the way you’d expect, a couple of neat twists keeping cliché at bay.

But, as I said, the primary interest is the verbal battle between two refined minds convinced they are the most important people on the planet. The only standout scenes not involving Evans concern Schiller’s “seduction” of Annabelle and the playing of the American national anthem by one of the soldiers, planted in the orchestra, who Arndt suspects, from his age (too young to be in such august company unless a musical prodigy), doesn’t fit in.

Charlton Heston (Number One, 1969) and Maximilian Schell (Topkapi, 1964) are both superb as flawed characters. There’s a rare movie appearance for Kathryn Hays (Ride Beyond Vengeance, 1966) and another chance to see Leslie Nielsen (Beau Geste, 1966) before he became comedy catnip.

But it’s the script by James Lee (Banning, 1967) and Joel Oliansky (The Todd Killings, 1971), that really delivers, although I’m guessing that the best lines came directly from the source novel, The General by Alan Sillitoe (Saturday Night and Sunday Morning). Directed by Ralph Nelson (Once a Thief, 1965).

Rare to get a movie that relies so much on script and actors on such top form.

Underrated gem.

PREVIOUSLY REVIEWED IN THE BLOG: Charlton Heston in Diamond Head (1962), 55 Days at Peking (1963), Major Dundee (1965), The War Lord (1965), Khartoum (1966), Planet of the Apes (1968), Number One (1969); Maximilian Schell in Judgement at Nuremberg (1961), Topkapi (1964), Fate is the Hunter (1964), Father Goose (1964), Return from the Ashes (1965), The Deadly Affair (1967), Krakatoa -East of Java (1968); Ralph Nelson directed Soldier in the Rain (1963), Once a Thief (1965), Duel at Diablo (1966) and Soldier Blue (1970).

Eagles over London (1969) ***

Presumably intended to capitalize on/rip-off the same year’s big-budget roadshow The Battle of Britain manages to cram in a pack of action beginning with a tank ambush in Normandy, the Dunkirk evacuation, the Battle of Britain, rooftop shoot-outs, ending up with an audacious attack of RAF High Command by a team of German saboteurs. As notable for technical achievement, split screen – sometimes split diagonally or quartered – in the manner of The Boston Strangler (1968) and The Thomas Crown Affair (1968), shots through various tiny holes, scenes filmed overhead, and a dazzling swirling camera sequence that would normally presage intimacy but here means death.

Somehow manages to squeeze a surprising number of dramatic moments focusing on relationships, a brief nod to homosexuality, and emulating Fraulein Doktor (1969) in giving the Germans credit for astute and effective espionage. Obvious use of stock footage for the air fight sequences, but you wonder what else has been cobbled out of the vaults given the preponderance of scenes requiring massive numbers of extras. Throw in Hollywood veteran Van Johnson (Divorce American Style, 1967) and a particularly good Cockney sergeant (Renzo Palmer) and it hardly lets up.

So, Captain Stevens (Frederick Stafford) heads up a unit delaying the German blitzkrieg in France in 1940. The Germans, led by Donovan (Francisco Rabal), meanwhile, are in disguise, assuming the identities of dead British soldiers with the intention of infiltrating Britain and destroying its radar installations. Inadvertently, Stevens saves Donovan’s life, thus giving the German accepted entry into British high command. Equally inadvertently Stevens allows the German access to his girlfriend Meg (Evelyn Stewart) who needs a shoulder to cry on. Donovan has his own girlfriend, Sheila (Teresa Gimpera) on tap, an undercover agent working as a barmaid, well-trained at collecting loose talk and seduction.

Elements of giallo keep popping up as the Germans need to embark on a murderous rampage to continue to acquire new identities to keep ahead of the pursuing investigation, one strangulation taking place in a gay sauna. Every now and then we pop into RAF High Command where Air Vice Marshal Taylor (Van Johnson) is helping thwart the German aerial attacks and in the end, since more bodies are required, elects to go into battle himself.

The small screen allows laughable moments – model airplanes crashing into the sea, cardboard radar installations toppling – to pass almost unnoticed since most of the rest of the action is well rendered, the rooftop scene especially, and the other various shoot-outs where – shock to the system – the British are constantly outwitted and outgunned.

Mostly, you’ll note how stylish a concoction this is given the low budget. Excellent sex scene against the background of exploding bombs, the duping of our hero by the enemy, and one terrific scene where Sheila is deemed surplus to requirements, calmly accepting her fate on condition that it’s her lover who pulls the trigger.

This would have been solid support material in English-speaking countries but most likely a main feature in its Italian homeland. Might have even done better if distributors waited until Afred Hitchcock’s Topaz (1969) appeared since he recruited Frederick Stafford as his leading man. Stafford was always under-rated but he keeps this afloat, though the Germans have the more interesting roles, especially Francisco Rabal and Teresa Gimpel. Evelyn Stewart (The Whip and the Body, 1964) has a smaller part.

Not content with introducing far more style and, shall we say, flamboyance, than the material might suggest director Enzo G. Castellari (Any Gun Can Play, 1967) has the audacity to end by using Winston Churchill’s “the few” speech to halt the traffic so the British lovers can catch up with each other.

A classic example of what an interesting director can do with what in other hands would be more mundane material. Not quite sure why it took five screenwriters.

Surprisingly fun watch overloaded with style.

REVIEWED PREVIOUSLY IN THE BLOG: Frederick Stafford in Topaz (1969), Evelyn Stewart in The Whip and the Body (1964), Van Johnson in Divorce American Style (1967).

Quadruple Bill: Ferrari (2023) ** / Anyone But You (2023) * / One Life (2024) * / Next Goal Wins (2023)

The stars aligned and with only a couple of minutes between features I was able to squeeze in a record-equalling four movies in a single day (excepting all-nighters of course) at the cinema and with one exception they were all well worth the ticket price.

Ferrari

Not really a motor racing picture in the mold of Ford v Ferrari / Le Mans ’66 (2019) or Rush (2013) but more of a domestic drama centering around a dramatic race. The acting is plum, Penelope Cruz (The 355, 2022) taking the honors ahead of Adam Driver (House of Gucci, 2021) though Shailene Woodley (The Last Letter from Your Lover, 2021) seems miscast. The climactic race doesn’t carry the punch of Le Mans, however, the focus more on the backseat players than the drivers. And it’s not quite prime Michael Mann (Heat, 1995)

Set about decade before Ford v Ferrari, it finds Enzo Ferrari (Adam Driver) coping with the death the year before of his only son, the potential collapse of his business, and trying to conceal long-standing mistress Lina Lardi (Shailene Woodley) from long-suffering wife Laura (Penelope Cruz).

The depth of the couple’s despair at the loss of their son can be measured in the fact that every morning they take flowers, separately, to his graveside. He has at hand an immediate substitute, having fathered a boy, now approaching ten years old, with his mistress, but rejects the chance to officially gave the boy his name.

The manufacturing side of the business was always viewed as merely a way of financing the racing, Ferrari having been a driver earlier in his life. But overspending or lack of income, such details are not specified, has pushed the business towards bankruptcy and he toys with inviting a merger with a bigger company such as Fiat or Henry Ford (which formed a central plank of Ford v Ferrari). But the easiest way out is to win Italy’s most prestigious race, the Mille Miglia, a four-day 992-mile event that ran clockwise across public roads from Brescia to Rome and back.

But I had to look that up. Unlike Le Mans, unless you are a racing aficionado, this doesn’t immediately click in the public consciousness. And there were a host of other details that seemed to skimp on information. Unlike Ford v Ferrari where you learned exactly how fast cars got faster and what it took to drive them or be driven in one (witness Henry Ford’s terrifying hurl), here you are only given some vague technical data which makes little sense. There is little background fill, Maserati pops up as Ferrari’s chief rival but its inclusion is almost incidental. In fairness, you do get more about the jiggery-pokery of running a business.

Running parallel to the racing venture is the family soap opera, will Laura find out about the mistress and child, will she jeopardize the business out of spite. Once the race starts, it’s hard to keep up. Here the distinct lack of detail hurts the most, although there is one shocking scene.

Engrossing enough but it’ll struggle to fill cinemas.

Anyone But You

A contemporary take on the rom-com with the disgruntled participants of a one-night stand forced to pair up at a wedding where they encounter an abundance of exes and various interfering family members. Glen Powell, star in the making in Top Gun: Maverick (2022), comes good as does Sydney Sweeney (The Voyeurs, 2021). Skipping the raw rudeness of its immediate predecessors, this pivots on charm, but with a few helpings of humiliation (he strips naked to avoid a predatory spider) and slapstick thrown in, plus some old-style determinedly un-woke action from one parent in particular. He is the more vulnerable, a poor swimmer, requiring a soothing song to fly. The plot is over-plotted and occasionally it seems some incidents have come straight from Room 101, but generally it works. Probably it helps, if I’m permitted of offer such a comment, that they are A-grade beefcake and cheesecake, respectively. Setting that aside, they appear to have mastered the lost art of the rom-com and certain drew appreciative laughter from the audience I was part of. the kind of film that in the olden days would have picked up a sizeable audience on DVD and turned into the kind of cult that guaranteed a return joust.

One Life

A film of two halves when it should have been divided into three-quarters and one-quarter or an even stiffer division. Concerning the efforts of the “British Schindler” Nicholas Winton (Johnny Flynn playing the younger version, Anthony Hopkins the older) to smuggle out of Prague over 600 Jewish children at the outbreak of World War Two. The earlier section is far more gripping and the later section that revolves apparently around an attempt to publicize the previous rescue in order to highlight the plight of later refugees falls mostly flat on its face as it seems more intent on glamorizing the actions of a man who wanted anything but public recognition. Too much time is spent pillorying a society that sanctified such inanities as the long-running That’s Life television program when I felt it would have been more sensible, and fair, to devote more attention to the work of Winton’s collaborators. While the climactic scene where Winton meets, as grown-ups, the children he saved is moving, it feels redundant compared to the actual children-saving.

Next Goal Wins

Eventually, it turns into a feel-good picture but for most of the time seems intent on making fun of Samoans carrying the tag of the world’s worst team. Nobody seems to ask why FIFA is so determined to bring football to countries where there is no interest in the game. Oddly, Michael Fassbender turns in his most accessible performance as the coach drafted in to improve the team, a big ask since he has clearly been a flop at his chosen profession. You could have pinned the movie more easily on the transgender player more accepted in Samoa than virtually any other country in the world who, by default, becomes the first transgender to play in the World Cup.

Remake Double Bill – The Three Musketeers: Milady, or Part Deux if you prefer (2023) * / Godzilla Minus One (2023) *

The Three Musketeers

Cherchez la femme, as they say in French. Here, because everyone is doubling up (or doubling down, I never get that right, and it is of course a sequel), the narrative has our heroes (and these being four musketeers if you include D’Artagnan and not three) chasing all over France in pursuit of two women.

If you recall from episode one (and it doesn’t matter if you don’t because this starts with a neat re-cap), D’Artagnan’s (Francois Civil) girlfriend Constance (Lyna Khoudri) has been abducted after overhearing details of a plot to kill King Louis XIII (Louis Garrel), so he’s trying to find her. Meanwhile, everyone’s after Milady (Eva Green), the double-crosser’s double-crosser. In fact, to complicate matters, the movie begins with her being rescued by D’Artagnan.

As it turns out, that’s one of the easiest complications because unless you’ve got a PhD in French history, you won’t have a clue what’s going on, what with imminent English invasion, traitors inside the palace, eternal bad guy Cardinal Richelieu (Eric Ruf) and the French laying siege to their own port of La Rochelle. I’m guessing, because it’s not exactly plain, that the background is Catholic vs Protestant enmity.

I’d forgotten of course that our heroes are called musketeers for a reason and it’s not because they are swashbucklers, though they are pretty nifty with the sword, but the name indicates a certain dexterity with muskets. So, there’s rather a lot more guns being fired and buckles being swashed.

And you could be forgiven for thinking this is some kind of riposte to Downton Abbey because everywhere our heroes go there is sure to be some fabulous chateau or castle and all kinds of pomp and circumstance. It’s a tad overladen with characters and not all stand out enough. D’Artagnan doesn’t quite command the screen and of other trio it’s lusty Porthos (Pio Marmai) who steals the show, always ready with a chat-up line or falling down unconscious from alcoholic intake.

Milady is by the far the most interesting character, tying all the males in knots, escaping every type of peril, dodging the hangman’s noose and an inferno and setting up Part III with a clever climax. Although the period wasn’t rife with feminism, she is the poster girl, not just adept with any weapon (including teeth), but detailing what it’s like to be eternally molested by men.

Constance, on the other hand, is as dumb as they come. The scene that allows D’Artagnan to wallow in pathos, you can’t help howling with laughter because the stupid girl has brought on herself a pitiless fate.

Sets quite a pace, but sometimes it’s hard to keep up with the politics and who is romancing who, and why someone who has been helpful in the past now has to be bumped off.

I hope this has earned its big budget back in France because I doubt if it will do well anywhere else.

Feels like director Martin Bourboulon (Eiffel, 2021) has bitten off more than anybody can chew.

Godzilla Minus One

Not just a remake but, as it turns out, a prequel. It’s nipped in early, ahead of the next vehicle in the recycle business Kong vs Godzilla due out next year.

In this Japanese version, made by Toho Studios which was responsible for the 1954 original, the timeline is 1945-1947. It kicks off at the end of World War Two with cowardly Japanese kamikaze pilot Skikishima (Ryonusuke Kamiki) unable to pull the trigger as the monster emerges from the depths. Fast forward to U.S. nuclear tests on the Bikini Atholl, and the creature now mutates with devastating impact on the mainland.

By this point, Skikishima has acquired an orphaned baby and takes on a job on a minesweeper (his trigger finger now put to good use) destroying the thousands of mines left behind after the war so he’s in the front line when the monster re-emerges with an atomic heat-ray in its arsenal, never find those stomping feet and destructive tail.

There’s some clever scientific ruses to destroy Godzilla involving Freon tanks (whatever they are) and some jiggery-pokery to lower the water’s buoyancy (what now?) but basically as you might expect it’s mostly our favorite monster decimating cities and taking on every warship and airplane that the country can throw at it.

It’s pretty good fun but you might find it hard to sympathize with a kamikaze pilot.

The Heroes of Telemark (1965) ****

Stellar World War Two mission picture, replete with tension and thrilling ski chases, told with some style, and with a conscience, probing the issue of civilian collateral damage. Sensibilities were not so inflamed at the time when the US, as demonstrated in Oppenheimer (2023), dropped the atomic bomb on Japan, causing the deaths of hundreds of thousands of non-military personnel. Here, at stake are the 6,000 townspeople who live around the plant housing the German experiments into heavy water, the alternative method for building an atom bomb.

When the safety of the entire world is in the balance, and death is doled out by remote bombers, thousands of feet up, with no close-up of the carnage, it appears far more acceptable than when you are planting a bomb on a ferry boat, knowing you are possibly consigning all the passengers to drowning.

That’s the climax of this well-plotted and well-constructed quite thrilling last picture from director Anthony Mann (The Fall of the Roman Empire, 1964) – he died during the making of A Dandy in Aspic (1967) so that cannot be fully ascribed to him and in any case this is a much better send-off.

Probably old-school British and Hollywood pictures were to blame for depicting scientists as stuffy individuals, allowing work to overrule romance. But as Oppenheimer demonstrated, that was not always the case and here we are introduced to top Norwegian egghead Rolf (Kirk Douglas) when he is stealing an illicit fumble with an employee in the darkroom.

The Germans are racking up production of heavy water, aiming to produce – drip by endless drip – 10,000lb of the stuff in double quick time. Norwegian saboteurs led by Knut (Richard Harris) hitch a ride by boat to Britain to inform the Allies of the danger. The obvious solution is to bomb the hell out of the factory, despite the impact on the civilian population.

But that fails. Plan B, dropping 50 highly-trained British commandos, into snow-covered Norway, comes a cropper when the plane crashes. A beautifully-filmed sequence, by the way, in extreme long shot, with one character at the front to provide perspective, a burst of flame at the far end of the white landscape.

So the saboteurs have to do it for themselves, the reluctant Rolf forced into action since he’s the only one, purportedly, who knows where to place the plastic explosive around the tanks holding the heavy water. The Norwegians shoot themselves in the foot by, in limiting the potential civilian casualties, only aiming to blow up the water tanks not the entire factory. Turns out the clever Germans have their own Plan B, other tanks already assembled which can be quickly fitted in the event of such sabotage.

Now with the plant more heavily guarded, access is impossible, and the only chance to stop the consignment of heavy water reaching Germany is to stop it getting there, by blowing up the train carrying the materiel as it crosses the fjord by ferry. Had this sabotage taken place in Germany, nobody would have given two hoots about the passengers, collateral damage be hanged. But this being Norwegians, Rolf feels duty bound to remain on board rather than escape, and formulate a plan to minimize the casualties.

I’m not sure how true that aspect is, it feels like something intended to present the main characters in a less ruthless light, although in reality the bombs were positioned and timed to help make survival easier.

Although told in semi-documentary style a la the same year’s Operation Crossbow, In Harm’s Way and Battle of the Bulge, with the aforementioned sensibilities to the fore, and the re-firing of romance between Rolf and divorced wife Anna (Ulla Jacobsen), the ruthless Nazi habit of executing hostages any time one of their soldiers is killed or even attacked, a traitor in the camp, open hostility between Rolf and Knut and stunning ski sequences that are the equal of anything in the James Bond canon, this is a riveting watch.

Must have been one of the cheapest music scores and screenplays on record given how often the director dispensed with both dialog and music during the lengthy sabotage scenes. When dialog was permitted, it was often sharp or humorous.

There was no stiffer upper lip in Hollywood than that of Kirk Douglas (The Brotherhood, 1968) though his hard-nosed demeanor is alleviated by romance and his efforts to minimise civilian casualties. Richard Harris (This Sporting Life, 1963) always seemed ready to explode. Ulla Jacobsen (Zulu, 1964) and Michael Redgrave (Assignment K, 1964) bring some class to the supporting roles.

Tremendous piece of direction by Anthony Mann, as adept at the action and building tension as handling the personality clashes between the principals and the intimacy of romance. Ivan Moffat (Tender Is the Night, 1962) and Ben Barzman (The Blue Max, 1966) wrote the screenplay based on a memoir by Knut Haueklid and the novel But for These Men by John Drummond.

A fitting last hurrah for Anthony Mann.

https://amzn.to/3Rz0azh

Beach Red (1967) ****

Strangely neglected in part I guess because the violence is countered by humanity. Despite the visceral images it lacks the narrative drive of a World War Two picture like The Dirty Dozen (1967), Cross of Iron (1977), Saving Private Ryan (1998) or Inglorious Bastards (2009). But the violence removes it from arthouse consideration when, in fact, the unusual combination and the cinematic techniques involved suggest it is ripe for reassessment.

There’s nothing particularly different about the storyline. Bunch of U.S. grunts land on a Philippine island occupied by the Japanese. The rookies are caught between caring commander Capt MacDonald (Cornel Wilde) and the uncaring tough Sgt Honeywell (Rip Torn). Some live, some die.

What was unusual for the time was the intensity of war. You can just imagine Steven Spielberg watching this to see how to out-do its 30-minute opening sequence when he came to film the D-Day section of his film. Where Spielberg placed more emphasis on sound and had the budget for more gruesome special effects, nonetheless director Cornel Wilde serves up the most brutal conflict of the decade.

From the outset, however, Wilde gets inside the head of the terrified soldiers. Some are just so scared they collapse on the sand and are unable to move. Told to fix bayonets, Cliff (Patrick Wolfe) is traumatised at the fear of being bayoneted himself. But, intriguingly, most of what we learn about the soldiers comes not from dialogue but internal monologue, as their minds are bombarded with memories of better times, wives, girlfriends and children left behind.

There’s also the stupidity of the inexperienced. The hapless Cliff shoots a Jap without realizing he had just been captured by Sgt Honeywell who had been sent on a mission to secure an enemy soldier for Capt MacDonald, with the aid of a Japanese-speaking soldier, to interrogate.

The captured soldier’s arms have been broken by Honeywell, not simply to incapacitate him, but out of brutal intent. The sergeant has no struck with MacDonald’s humanity, it’s kill or be killed, “It’s him or you, baby,” is his mantra.

But for director Wilde, the enemy is not faceless. And he spends far more time than any other even-handed director of the era in ensuring the Japanese are seen as first and foremost as human beings with the same feelings as the Americans, staring at photos of their beloved, or accorded brief flashbacks where they are shown laughing with their children, loving their wives, one caught in such a reverie being humiliated by a furious commanding officer.

What in a more ordinary war picture would be deemed a piece of flagrant sentimentality, wounded rival soldiers sharing water and cigarettes, here takes on another dimension, as each recognizes in the other their common humanity.

Nor are the women window dressing. Cliff desperate to lose his virginity before going off to war has to contend with a frightened girlfriend. MacDonald recalling an intimate moment with wife Julie (Jean Wallace) remembers mostly her fear that she will be left a widow.

And the director is not above irony. The Japanese, initiating a clever rearguard maneuver to catch the Americans off-guard, are slaughtered on the same beach as had originally been taken by the landing troops.

In some respects, the director’s vision is compromised by critical reaction. Less of the violence, concentrating more on the thoughts and memories of the soldiers on both sides, and it would have been hailed as visionary. But the violence was viewed in many quarters as driven by commercial imperative, this being the year when screen violence (the spaghetti westerns, The Dirty Dozen, Bonnie and Clyde) ignited controversial debate.

Because of that, Wilde’s many stylistic innovations went unnoticed. He makes superb use of stills, flashbacks detailed in a series of photographic montages rather than moving images. And there’s a technique I’ve never seen before where the director focuses on a face only for it to dissolve within the frame, rather than the whole frame dissolve as would be the norm to indicate transition. And life goes on even as soldiers rampage, every now and then insects are shown in close-up going about their ordinary business regardless of the conflagration all around, their worlds too tiny to be overly disturbed.

In his directorial capacity Wilde (Sword of Lancelot / Lancelot and Guinevere, 1963) indicates intention with the theme song. Rather than the stirring music to which we are usually accustomed, this is a lament (sung, incidentally by his wife, Jean Wallace).

As well as acting and directing, Wilde had a hand in the screenplay along with previous collaborators Clint Johnson and Don Peters who both worked on Wilde’s earlier The Naked Prey (1965)

As much as we are struck by the intensity of the performances by the thoughtful and often glum Wilde, the rapacious Rip Torn (Sol Madrid, 1968) and the bewildered Patrick Wolfe (his only movie appearance and, incidentally, son to Jean Wallace from her first marriage to Franchot Tone), this is a director’s picture and easily stands comparison with the quartet of classics mentioned above.

The title, while indicative of slaughter, had in reality a much more prosaic meaning. The U.S. Army had the habit of assigning colors to differentiate between certain sections of beaches scheduled for invasion. This could as easily have been entitled Beach Blue or Beach Yellow but you have to concede Beach Red has a certain ring to it.

Definitely worth watching.