I am no expert on war movies, but it has always seemed to me that "The Enemy Below," which premiered on Christmas Day 60 years ago, was the first war movie that really portrayed the opposing combatants equally.
Well, maybe someone told me that way back when, and I just think that I have always thought that.
And maybe it wasn't the first war movie to be sympathetic to both sides — just the first to be that way about World War II.
It didn't draw any conclusions — except that there really was no difference between Robert Mitchum, who played the commander of an American destroyer, and Curt Jurgens, who played the commander of a German U–boat. Their characters were men who were defending their homelands.
They didn't start the war. It wasn't personal. In civilian life, they may or may not have held strong political views. As civilians, they might have liked each other, might have been friends. In war, they had jobs to do, and they did them.
Mitchum's character was newer to the job than Jurgens' was. It was a new command for Mitchum, and he was about as new to the Navy as most of his crew. The destroyer was on patrol but did not anticipate any action.
Jurgens, on the other hand, was a career Navy man whose sacrifices for Germany — two sons — had been considerable over the years. The U–boat was on courier duty and was likewise not expecting any combat.
Nevertheless on the silver screen, the captains and their crews were engaged in a taut thriller in the South Atlantic in which a mistake could be fatal.
They didn't want to think about what they had in common. That would get in the way of what had to be done.
At one point Mitchum remarked, "I have no idea what he is, what he thinks. I don't want to know the man I'm ... trying to destroy."
That's about as blunt as it gets.
(Incidentally, the slogan seen in the submarine — "Führer befiehl, wir folgen" — means "The leader commands, we follow.")
It's become a cliche to label something a cat–and–mouse game, but that is what this was. The analogy is apt.
In "The Enemy Below," both sides kept maneuvering until the final showdown. When the duel had been decided and the two captains caught a glimpse of one another, they exchanged silent salutes. Gestures of mutual respect.
It was that respect, perhaps, that led Mitchum to save the U–boat commander. Later, with the battle behind them, Mitchum's character offered a cigarette to his former adversary, who took it and remarked, "I should have died many times, Captain. But I continue to survive somehow."
Maybe that is what the art of warfare really is — the art of survival.
"I sell gasoline. I make a small profit. With that I buy groceries. The grocer makes a profit. We call it earning a living. You may have heard of it somewhere."
Jeff (Robert Mitchum)
One of my favorite Paul Simon songs never made much of a ripple on the radio but rode "50 Ways to Leave Your Lover" to the top of the charts as its B side — "Some Folks' Lives Roll Easy."
"Out of the Past," which debuted on this day in 1947, always makes me think of that song.
Because, as the song says, some folks' lives do roll easy, and "some folks' lives never roll at all." Some people follow straight trajectories onward and upward to the top (or, at least, in that general direction); most of us, I guess, have something in our pasts from which we're trying to escape.
In director Jacques Tourneur's "Out of the Past," Robert Mitchum was trying to break free from his past as a private investigator. But, like Al Pacino in "The Godfather Part III," he kept being pulled back in.
The story line doesn't exactly roll easy, either, but that is what might just make "Out of the Past" one of the best film noirs of all time — maybe even the best. Don't sit back to watch this with a beer in your hand, though. You'll need all your wits about you to keep up with the twists and turns in this one.
You'll find it is worth it.
There is an intriguing dynamic between Mitchum and Kirk Douglas, who were distinctly different in their styles. In a typical film noir way, the movie reeks with symbolism from the (literally) dark scenes to the clear cinematic triangle of good–guy Mitchum, bad–guy Douglas and femme fatale Jane Greer.
Douglas was a gangster, and Greer was his mistress. Douglas alleged Greer had shot him and stolen money from him; Mitchum, as a private investigator, had been hired to track her down.
After he found Greer, Mitchum became infatuated with her and ultimately confessed that he had been hired to find her. This did not come as a surprise to Greer; in fact, she had suspected as much and had been preparing her story all along.
And what a story it was. She denied stealing Douglas' money and urged Mitchum to run away with her. But Mitchum discovered that she was a liar and a killer.
Then the story got complicated ...
It is probably important to note that much of the story was told through flashbacks. After Mitchum and Greer eventually split up and Mitchum tried to start over again as a gas station operator, part of his new life involved a new girlfriend. This one, played by Virginia Huston, was much nicer, a real girl next door, and it was to her that Mitchum told the story as they were driving to meet with Douglas.
"She can't be all bad," Huston said at one point. "No one is."
"She comes closest," Mitchum replied.
His character was right about that. Greer had the qualities of a great femme fatale — on the screen as in life, a true femme fatale has no remorse for anything she does. She is completely self–centered, and she is beautiful and seductive enough that any man, even ones as smart and as tough as the ones with whom she was involved in "Out of the Past," could fall for her.
Although uncredited in many of his early films, Mitchum was known largely as a film noir actor at first. In hindsight, he seems like a natural choice for the role in "Out of the Past," but he was the fourth choice to play the part. Humphrey Bogart was the first choice, and by all accounts I have read he wanted to play it, but Bogart was under contract to Warner Brothers and RKO Pictures owned the rights to "Out of the Past."
John Garfield and Dick Powell turned down the role, and it went to Mitchum.
When I was in junior high, I was assigned to do a book report on Cornelius Ryan's "The Longest Day."
Looking back, I would have to say that the book was probably a bit beyond my years. I mean, I love history — I have always loved history — and I love a good story, but the book was a bit technical for me, at least at that time in my life.
I didn't know who most of the people in the book were. I guess I hadn't studied World War II or D–Day too much at that point, had no idea, really, of their significance in American history.
And in my mind, too, I suppose, that was my parents' war — but they had been children when it was fought. It was probably more my grandparents' war. Either way, I probably saw it as their history, not mine.
Perhaps that is how it is for everyone. Major events that have gone before belong to someone else. The current ones belong to whoever is coming of age, and generations to come will have their own. It depends on whose time it is, and even though it is technically true that a time belongs to all who live through it, it truly belongs to those who are coming of age, whose impressions are still being formed. For the most part the rest of us share ownership of that time.
But not always.
Remember Sally Field in "Forrest Gump" and what she told her son as she was dying?
"It's my time," she said. "It's just my time."
People tend to be more in tune to what happens in their times — and less so about what happens in other people's times.
But I guess I am slipping away from the point — which is that "The Longest Day" was a good history lesson, whether in print or on the big screen.
"The Longest Day" had an all–star cast — so many stars I can't name 'em all.
In that sense it reminded me of "Tora! Tora! Tora!" the definitive dramatization of Pearl Harbor.
There were actors everyone should be able to recognize — Henry Fonda, Richard Burton, Sean Connery and John Wayne, for example — and others whose faces are familiar but you've really got to be past a certain age (or of a certain time, to return to my earlier theme) to know their names — I suppose Eddie Albert, Peter Lawford and Robert Mitchum fall in that category.
It also reminded me of "Tora! Tora! Tora!" in the sense that it was faithful to the facts of the story, which were dramatic enough.
It was filmed in black and white in a documentary style at a cost of $10 million. For nearly 30 years it was the most expensive black–and–white film ever made — until "Schindler's List."
The movie brought to life the story in a way the book couldn't do for me when I was 14.
I don't know how much of that story young people are taught in school today, but the parts I found the most compelling were the accounts of the tricks the Allies used in the battle with the Germans.
Like dropping mannequins with parachutes to deceive the Nazis into thinking an expected invasion was happening in an unanticipated area.
Or using an attractive young female bicyclist as a diversion to slip a wagonload of resistance operatives past Nazi soldiers.
The last time I watched it I couldn't help thinking that the invasion of Normandy as presented in "The Longest Day" was probably the most realistic depiction of modern warfare committed to film until "Saving Private Ryan."
"The Longest Day" received five Academy Award nominations and took home two Oscars — for Black–and–White Cinematography and Visual Effects.
On the eve of any armed conflict, there is that almost surreal will–they–or–won't–they kind of period when the people whose lives (most of them, anyway) will be shattered by decisions they do not make and actions they do not take are cast into limbo. And they wait to see if, well, they will or they won't.
Then the inevitable happens, and they must adapt to the new situation. Sometimes it requires them to shift their attitudes and their beliefs.
"One Minute to Zero," which made its debut on this day in 1952, was about such a time in the early days of the Korean War.
Ann Blyth, who was 23 at the time, played an idealistic United Nations worker in Korea just before the outbreak of the war — a pacifist who rejected all the evidence around her that a war was imminent. Like all of us, her character was shaped by its experiences, and she had lost her husband in World War II. Like many others she believed the U.N. was the legacy of the Allies' victory in World War II and that its mission was to prevent violent conflict around the world. She mistakenly believed it would do so in Korea.
I don't recall if her character's age was mentioned in the movie, but it is likely that Blyth was playing a character at least a few years older. Blyth was about 16 when World War II ended.
Robert Mitchum played a career military man who had risen to the rank of colonel. Experience had made him more pragmatic about the situation, and Blyth's character ultimately acquiesced.
Not to take a position in this, but it seemed to me that Blyth's character was eager to switch sides, perhaps a bit too eager. But that was in keeping with the rest of the movie, I thought. And it was in keeping with the times and the perceived woman's role in relationships, I suppose.
While I can think of several movies that managed to combine a good war story with a good love story in which characters didn't have to sacrifice principle, "One Minute to Zero" seemed to do little more than string together cliches from the better movies of its type — and the relationship between Blyth's character and Mitchum's character was a little too formulaic for my taste.
By and large, the females in the movies of that time yielded to the men in their lives on most things. I'm not suggesting that female leads in movies should arbitrarily take positions that are opposite of their significant others' simply to establish their independence. But neither should they go so far to the other extreme.
Perhaps that is something that was learned in that era — but is not always practiced today.
Early in the movie Blyth's character clearly had principles, but it didn't take much for her to shift to Mitchum's more pragmatic position that one had to fight fire with fire.
I learned long ago that you really can't reach a conclusion based strictly on Academy Award nominations — and the class of 1952 is a good example of that — but they can provide some insight into the quality of a movie.
And "One Minute to Zero" received no Oscar nominations.
"I got somethin' planned for your wife and kid that they ain't nevah gonna forget. They ain't nevah gonna forget it, and neither will you, Counselor! Nevah!"
Max Cady (Robert Mitchum)
I actually saw the 1991 remake of "Cape Fear" before I saw the original, which made its debut on this day in 1962.
And I will admit that I was impressed (as well as a bit frightened) by the long menacing scene between Juliette Lewis and Robert De Niro. They were both very good in that movie, and that scene they did together was quite effective.
But all things considered I thought the version that premiered 55 years ago today was better. I reached that conclusion long before I learned that Alfred Hitchcock was originally supposed to be the director — and actually did the original storyboard for the movie — but quit the project over a squabble. Had I known at the time of Hitchcock's connection to the original project, I probably would have wanted to see that version first.
Even though he didn't end up directing the movie, Hitchcock's fingerprints were all over the finished work. Of that I am certain. The camera angles, the unusual lighting, the eerie Bernard Herrmann music that was so prominent in Hitchcock movies ("Psycho," "North by Northwest," "Vertigo"). All Hitchcockian touches.
The story was the kind of scenario that most prosecutors must fear in their waking moments — and possibly even after they fall asleep at night.
Gregory Peck played a lawyer in a small town who had to deal with the fact that a man he helped put in prison eight years earlier (Robert Mitchum) had been released. He had been convicted of attacking a woman, and now he was back in town, terrorizing Peck, his wife (Polly Bergen) and their young daughter (Lori Martin).
As good as De Niro was, Mitchum was the personification of menacing. In fact, in comparison, De Niro's performance was almost comical. Mitchum was truly terrifying. And the thing was he didn't really have to do anything — just stand there and stare.
If looks could kill.
The remake of "Cape Fear" had its good points, but it was chaotic in its story telling. As I say, the original was better. It was more focused, it was scarier, and its villain was more heinous.
I know people who won't watch the original because they don't watch black–and–white movies. They equate quality with flash and dash, with explosions and bright lights, all the bells and whistles of modern filmmaking.
And perhaps such people will never appreciate what black–and–white movies usually accomplished without all those bells and whistles.
They told good stories.
With Peck and Mitchum, "Cape Fear" clearly had a great cast, but it also featured some real talent in the supporting roles — Martin Balsam as the police chief and Telly Savalas as a private detective.
And, of course, Martin as Peck's daughter.
In the remake, there was a budding romance between Lewis and De Niro, but Martin never had an attraction to Mitchum. He terrified her.
And viewers could see themselves being protective of someone as young and innocent as Martin.
Of course, she wasn't the only one who needed protecting.
By the way, Peck, Mitchum and Bergen all appeared in the 1991 remake — but in different roles.
As hard as it is to believe in hindsight, "Cape Fear" was hardly a success at the box office, presumably because of its content — and it received no Academy Award nominations, presumably because the Academy usually prefers to reward feel–good movies, and "Cape Fear" was hardly a feel–good movie.
I have never read Charles Shaw's novel on which John Huston's "Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison," which premiered on this day in 1957, was based.
But if the movie was true to the book, I think I would like to read it sometime.
I guess it would be called an "offbeat love story." But I've never really liked that phrase because it suggests that it is an atypical love story. But what, pray tell, is a typical love story? Aren't all love stories unique? A love story may share certain characteristics with other love stories, but it seems to me that every love story is unique because the people involved in them are unique, and their circumstances are unique to them.
When the movie began, the audience saw an inflatable life raft floating somewhere in the south Pacific in 1944. Stretched out in the raft was Robert Mitchum. The audience later learned that he was a Marine aboard a submarine who had managed to escape after being fired on by the Japanese.
Mitchum didn't speak for the first eight or nine minutes of the movie. In fact, there was no dialogue at all for the first eight or nine minutes. It was during that time that Mitchum's life raft floated near an apparently uninhabited island, and he made his way to it. As Mitchum explored the island, he saw structures in which others had lived at one time, but there was no one to be seen.
And the audience could more or less imagine the questions that were going through his mind. Who had lived there? Was anyone still around? Were they friendly or hostile?
Then he came upon a building that was clearly a church, but there was no human activity around it and no sound coming from it — until a nun (Deborah Kerr) emerged with a broom.
Kerr told Mitchum she had only been on the island a few days. She came with a priest to evacuate another priest, but they discovered that the Japanese beat them to it. The natives who brought them to the island were scared and left abruptly. The priest, who was elderly, died a short time after, and the nun had been left alone on the island. At least until Mitchum arrived.
For awhile the two were alone on the island — until some Japanese landed with the intention of setting up a meteorological camp — a place to monitor weather conditions and provide up–to–the–minute data for Japanese forces. Mr. Allison and the nun retreated to a cave and kept out of sight. For food Mr. Allison would go out spearfishing after dark when he figured the Japanese weren't watching, but they couldn't risk a fire so they had to eat whatever he caught raw. The nun found it hard to digest so Mr. Allison crept to the camp and stole some canned goods.
While he was doing that he could see flashes on the horizon and concluded there was some kind of naval battle between American and Japanese forces. The Japanese who were on the island soon left, which led to all sorts of speculation on Mr. Allison's part about who had won the battle, whether anyone would be coming to their island and what that would mean for them. Partly out of frustration and partly out of jubilation, I suppose, Allison got drunk on some sake that had been left behind.
That was when he confessed to the nun his true feelings for her. He told her he loved her and he thought it was pointless for her to remain dedicated to her vows — she had not yet taken her final vows — since they were stranded on the island with little hope of being saved.
The nun ran out into the night and a tropical rain, becoming ill in the process. After Mr. Allison sobered up he found her shivering and carried her back to the camp. Meanwhile the Japanese had returned, and Mr. Allison took the nun back to the cave.
Mr. Allison tried to care for her, but she needed blankets, and the only blankets to be found were in the Japanese camp. He went back there to get some and was discovered, forcing him to kill a Japanese soldier. Consequently the Japanese realized they were not alone and started setting fires in the jungle to force the pair out into the open.
They remained in the cave, though, and expected a grenade to be thrown in with them — until they heard an explosion that Mitchum realized was not a grenade. It was a bomb. The Americans were attacking the island ahead of their landing.
Mitchum also knew that, when they returned to the island, the Japanese brought four big artillery guns that were well concealed — and he knew where they were. When the Americans tried to land, Mitchum mused, the Japanese would come out of their bunkers and open fire with those guns. It would be a messy landing.
Then he had the inspiration to disable the weapons before the landing began, and that is what he did. He was injured in doing so, but he still managed to disable them, and the Americans easily overpowered the Japanese.
As the movie ended, the nun told Mitchum, in what the audience presumed would be the last time they would see each other, that they would always be close companions, and the Americans were puzzled by how the Japanese weapons had been disabled.
Mr. Allison never said a word. It was a time when movies and movie audiences still believed that virtue was its own reward.
"Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison" received two Oscar nominations. Kerr was nominated for Best Actress but lost to Joanne Woodward in "The Three Faces of Eve." And Huston was nominated with John Lee Mahin for Best Adapted Screenplay but lost to Michael Wilson, Carl Foreman and Pierre Boulle for "The Bridge on the River Kwai."
I got my bachelor's degree in journalism from the University of Arkansas, and I got my master's degree in journalism from the University of North Texas. Most of my adult life has been dedicated to writing and editing in one form or another. Most recently I have taught writing (news and developmental) as an adjunct journalism professor at Richland College, where I advise the student newspaper staff. Go, Thunderducks!
