Escape from Fort Bravo (1953)

Directed by John Sturges; produced by Nicholas Nayfack

In the middle of the American Civil War, and in the middle of nowhere, a group of Confederate States soldiers plan to escape from the Union fort that is their prison. Their main obstacle – aside from being in the Arizona desert hundreds of miles from anywhere – is a ruthless cavalry troop commander, Captain Roper (William Holden), whose casual ferocity has never failed to capture escapees. But the prisoners have a secret weapon, a woman (Eleanor Parker) coming to the fort for a visit. In league with the Southerners, she, however, has her own difficulties, starting with her feelings for Roper.

Considering the stars, the director and the promising premise, Escape from Fort Bravo is a big disappointment. Holden does his usual fine job, playing a tough guy with dreams, and Parker is good as the woman confused by her emotions. Able support is loaned by other familiar names and faces: John Forsythe, William Demarest, William Campbell, Richard Anderson and Polly Bergen.

But the direction is bland, surprising since Struges also directed The Great Escape and The Magnificent Seven; his final effort was the entertaining The Eagle Has Landed. Indeed, his next film after Escape from Fort Bravo was the excellent Bad Day at Black Rock. But here, much of the third reel comprises a stand-off between troopers and prisoners on the one hand and Indians on the other, and it is nowhere as tense as I suspect it was meant to be. It is, in fact, rather boring.

The real villains in Escape from Fort Bravo are the story and the script. The Confederates’ scheme to escape includes, as mentioned above, the use of an outside accomplice, who also serves to decoy Roper’s attentions. But how she was apprised of the plan and its details, we don’t know. By letter? None is mentioned. She shows up at the fort for the wedding of a friend, intending to return to Texas a day or two later. I found it incredible that someone would travel hundreds of miles by stage-coach, in the middle of a civil war, through hostile Indian country, just to stay a few days, like it was the bus-trip in It Happened One Night.

Inconsistencies abound: Anderson’s character marries Bergen’s; the former’s commanding officer hesitates to send him on an assignment because the new husband is on his honeymoon. Yet he is seen, on duty, taking a roll-call of prisoners minutes earlier. A shop-keeper visiting the fort is questioned as to why he is returning to town without cavalry escort, even though numbers of wedding guests did the same just before.

Also, when asked why the prisoners aren’t under guard (though we see guards on duty), Roper explains that there is nowhere for them to go if they escaped – even though they do try to escape. It was strange to me that, since we are told there are as many prisoners as there are Union soldiers, the Confederates don’t simply seize control of the fort; a Union station under Confederate control would not only give an excellent chance of genuine escape, and put a large supply of munitions in their hands, but surely disrupt Union communications in that region.

There is no explanation for the threatening behaviour of the Indians in the story. They are described as Mescalero, and “on their way” to join Cochise, presumably in his fight against the U.S. government, and whites in general. This is not elaborated upon, nor is it stated that the Mescalero are a tribe of Apaches, which may have clarified matters somewhat. The revolt of the Apaches seems to be general knowledge, yet a small train of four wagons loaded with rifles - surely a prize to anyone in rebellion - travels without escort through hostile districts. For their part, the Indians’ notion of attack appears limited initially to riding at speed past a well-armed enemy. They later exhibit some ingenuity in hitting targets with their arrows, but I can’t see the intelligent and imaginative Cochise thinking these countrymen would be a particularly bright addition to his cause.

There is, as well, the small detail and big coincidence of Roper apparently having been raised in Arizona, joining the U.S. Army and finding the Federal cavalry regiment to which he belongs posted back to his home territory, while a million Northern soldiers are needed far to the east in the Civil War. It would have been better to have had him an officer in a local Arizona volunteer unit, kept in the land they knew, to guard the frontier during the current war.

Add to this the behaviour of the characters, which I felt was more appropriate for the 1950s than the 1860s, and the fact that the man who seems the senior officer of the prisoners is seeking to escape before almost all the others (perhaps I think too much of the form and protocol of World War Two POW-escape films), and the movie becomes just a costume drama: modern characters in fancy-dress.

The story is so terribly inconsistent, and the script half-hearted, that any other qualities Escape from Fort Bravo may have are lost in a mire of silliness and muddle. Consider watching some of Holden and Sturges’s other works instead.

Five Graves to Cairo (1943)

Directed by Billy Wilder; produced by Charles Brackett (associate producer)

It’s 1942, and in north Africa, the British have suffered a defeat at the hands of the Germans, led by Field Marshal Erwin Rommel (Erich von Stroheim). A survivor of the battle, Corporal Bramble (Franchot Tone), stumbling through the desert, arrives at an isolated community and collapses in the lobby of a hotel. Saved by Farid (Akim Tamiroff), the compassionate owner, and his cynical maid, Mouche (Anne Baxter), Bramble must impersonate a dead waiter when he learns that the hotel is about to become the German general headquarters. His charade becomes more complicated when he discovers that the man he is supposed to be was a German spy.

Billy Wilder’s only war-themed movie was his third directorial effort (but his forty-third produced screenplay!), and benefits from his deft hand. The film moves along quickly, with little excess dialogue; exposition is often included with on-going action, even if it is only a change of clothes or the preparation of a meal.

There is little fighting, and no combat; the war in Five Graves to Cairo is one of spies and intrigue, but the direction and script (co-written by the associate producer) keep it involving. 

The rather fantastical plot integrates the notion that the Germans were preparing for a north African war as early as 1937, which is untrue: German participation in the desert conflict was almost spontaneous, occurring only to salvage Axis fortunes after the annihilation of the Italian Tenth Army by the British. The premise, however, fits with the near-omniscience ascribed to the Germans in the movie, a trait held by many at the time in real-life, and which British Army officers in the desert were at great pains to contradict. Nonetheless, it heightens the suspense of the film, and is a key element of the story.

(The story, interestingly, is an adaptation of a 1917 play, in which the hero is an Austro-Hungarian Army officer, and the villains are Tsarist Russians. The versatility of the movie’s writers is shown in that their previous collaboration, the year before, was the successful mistaken identity comedy The Major and the Minor.)

The acting is good. There is a flaw in Tone’s performance in that he doesn’t even try to imitate an English accent of any kind. Aside from this, he is capable in the role, though not more. Baxter does well as a bit of a conniver, someone with a private agenda, a sort of role she would play more than once. The most interesting part, however, is reserved for Stroheim.

Five Graves to Cairo may have been unique in its time in having as a character - and not a minor one, either - a living, real-life personage, and an enemy soldier at that. Rommel was, and is, probably the only German general of World War Two respected by his opponents as a man, and not just as a commander. His reputation rests largely on his excellent performance in the Battle of France, his mastery of the ‘clean’ war in the desert, and his courtesy to his foes.

Whether or not this reputation is deserved, it is used in Five Graves to Cairo to create a man who is brilliant, arrogant, brutal, cultured, harsh and not without humour (witness his remark that ‘Germany needs paper,’ and, with a slight smile, ‘lots of paper’, perhaps referring to all the crap he’s heard in the Fatherland). Stroheim is excellent in the role.

That such a character could be incorporated in the film is a credit to the screenwriters, who, with the exception of an Italian general (Fortunio Bonanova), avoid stereotypes. Even the Egyptian Farid, who superficially seems a coward, is actually a brave and resourceful man. The character who is the least convincing, ironically, is the main one. The short synopsis we are given of Bramble’s personality does not suggest the inventive and dedicated individual we see on screen, though the précis of the character is given by Bramble himself, so it may be self-deprecation.

Despite a few mis-steps, this film is an enjoyable war-thriller with a decently complex plot and good writing. Add to these aspects characters who are well-performed and direction which is very well managed and Five Graves to Cairo becomes a satisfying adventure.

Things Change (1988)

Directed by David Mamet; produced by Michael Hausman

Gino (Don Ameche) is an elderly Chicago shoe-shine man, with a dream of owning a fishing boat in his native Sicily. He also resembles a Mob assassin who was identified by witnesses as the killer of a recently murdered man. Gino reluctantly agrees to impersonate the killer and go to prison for a few years, in return for enough money to fulfill his dream. Jerry (Joe Mantegna) is a disgraced low-level criminal assigned to look after Gino for a weekend, and deliver him to a courthouse the following Monday. Hoping to impress his charge - and boost his own ego - Jerry whisks the old man off to Lake Tahoe for some fun. For the next couple of days, however, fun and trouble are interchangeable.

Things Change is a change itself for David Mamet. His movies are usually driven by dialogue; indeed, a number of them, such as Glengarry Glen Ross, were originally written for the stage. Things Change is more about situation and character, both of which are revealed more by sight than by word. As well, Mamet’s well-known use of obscenities - usually unnecessary in movies but seeming quite natural in his scripts - is nearly unheard here. And finally, this is a comedy, with dramatic overtones. As one other reviewer wrote, a Mamet comedy is almost an oxymoron.

This effort reminded me of the attempt of another idiosyncratic director, David Lynch, to go in different direction with his excellent The Straight Story. While that change of pace was a success, Things Change is, regrettably, not.

The advantages to the movie are the actors and their performances. Ameche is perfect as the old shoe-shine man. Seemingly diffident, Gino has a definite personality; he appears simply to have had very little opportunity to reveal it. Humble he may be, but not quite meek.

Mantegna is equally well cast as his minder, a man who is submissive in the face of stronger, fiercer men, but boastful for those he thinks are smaller than he. Nonetheless, he is a kind man, who may have been somebody like Gino had been when young.

The cast is filled with Mamet ‘regulars’, such as Ricky Jay, J. J. Johnston and William H. Macy, and those connected with him, such as J. T. Walsh. They all do a fine job.

The problem here is the story. I’ve read that many consider Things Change to be a ‘gentle comedy’. I found it to be closer to a gentle farce - and a farce that is gentle just doesn’t work. Once in Tahoe, Gino and Jerry are tossed into situations of mistaken identities, wrong locations and awkward questions. There is even a scene of Mantegna sneaking out of a window which is reminiscent of the slamming doors and running cast-members of a traditional farce. But none of it is handled in the way it should be. Either the pace should have been frenetic (which would have been a mistake, I think) or the farcical element discarded all together for more subdued humour (which, admittedly, is also included.)

Various incidents are unbelievable, even in the context of comedy. Why would a small-time mafiioso fly himself and an old man off to Tahoe for a weekend just to impress the latter when he is already in deep trouble with his superiors? Where did he get the money? (Earlier, we see him being given an empty pay-envelope for botching his previous assignment.)

I also found it hard to credit the manager of a prestigious hotel handing over an entire floor and granting unlimited credit to unknown guests on the sole recommendation of a limousine driver. And at one point, a Mafia boss does a favour for Gino which would have crossed and annoyed a fellow boss and must surely have ruined the latter’s carefully laid plans. Despite the set-up for this favour, it is a trick that feels too neat.

Despite the performances, which are of the expected high calibre, Things Change is not very funny, not as charming as it would have liked to be, and a failed attempt at something different by a famed writer and director.

Phantom Lady (1944)

Directed by Robert Siodmak; produced by Joan Harrison (associate producer)

Civil engineer Scott Henderson (Alan Curtis) comes home one evening to find his wife murdered, and the police with just one suspect: him. Speedily convicted of the crime and sentenced to die, Henderson’s only alibi is a stranger (Ann Terry), with whom he innocently spent time; he doesn’t know her name or her address, and all others who saw her deny her existence. His principal defender is his loyal secretary, Carol Richman (Ella Raines). Dead ends and deceit, a murderous psychopath, and a looming execution date don’t give Carol much to work with to free her boss.

Though not without flaws, principally in the plot, Phantom Lady is an interesting and enjoyable film noir. It’s strongest points lie in the actors and directing. Ella Raines is lesser known today than many leading ladies of the black-and-white movie era, but she’s under-rated, and shows herself most capable here, principally due to her character needing to find resources within herself that most characters don’t need. She is the star, though Franchot Tone receives top billing due to his greater prominence at the time.

In regard to the other performers, Phantom Lady is a good example of both rather ordinary, and unbelievable characters being given more interest and credibility by the actors portraying them. Curtis makes his fall-guy likeable, while Tone manages to overcome the stereotyped traits given his character.

Thomas Gomez provides the police detective he plays with a sinister aspect at first, only to suggest later that it is part of his professional persona; an intriguing angle to the tough-cop character. Elisha Cook Jr, a mainstay of film noir, has perhaps the most memorable part as a particularly odious version of the crime-story weasel. His smarmy jazz drummer’s opinion of himself is in inverse proportion to his genuine appeal.

The direction by Siodmak shows his style well. Its use of lighting to create scenes that are both complex and simple are a characteristic of the genre, and Siodmak was one of its principal proponents. Working with cinematographer Woody (Elwood) Bredell, with whom he would collaborate on The Killers (1946), Siodmak makes almost bare sets look menacing.

But in some scenes, it’s all the director, as during the jive session in a basement, which is so claustrophobic and frenetic that one can practically see the loud, blaring music. And Henderson’s initial police interrogation: the closing in of the detectives, grinning and malevolent, becomes reminiscent of a lynch-mob.

All of these advantages overcome the weak plot, which has several holes - such as the killer’s alibi, described by that person with obvious pride but in fact hardly an alibi at all - and the detriment of revealing the murderer too early in the film. The story comes from a novel by William Irish, a pseudonym of the prolific Cornell Woolrich, and may not have been one of his most inventive. Even so, the cinematic adaptation is entertaining, if not quite involving, and worth a look.

(Two notes that don’t really have a bearing on the recommendation of the film: one is that many American films that were made during World War Two, but are not war-related, simply ignore the conflict, as if the story occurred just before the war, or is set just after it. This one records the date of a trial as ‘1943’, yet no one is in uniform and travel is unrestricted; the war goes unmentioned. This I found unusual.

And a more personal observation: I think the fashions in the 1940s were among the best of the century. Men, dressed as they were then, would look quite snazzy today, and not unduly out of place in a business meeting, while women’s clothes were becoming to almost every age, size and shape. Except the hats. A hat figures in Phantom Lady - it is even billed as “The Phantom Hat” in the opening credits - and is as prepostrous as many of them were. Yet it is the desideratum of several women in the movie. The look of every age has its incongruities. Women’s hats take ‘top’ spot in the ‘40s.)