The Deep Six (1958) User Reviews

Ladd on the downslope

[bkoganbing · 6/10 · 18 May 2004]

This is one of a series of films made by Alan Ladd on the downhill side of his career after he left Paramount. A lot of them were good routine action stuff that had made him so popular in the 1940s. But he was getting older and wouldn't transition into older character parts.

The Deep Six concerns a naval reserve officer who because of his Quaker upbringing freezes in a combat situation. The men on the ship lose confidence in him and his only friend is the CPO on the destroyer, played by William Bendix.

In fact Bendix gives the best performance in the film. Ladd and Bendix did several films together at Paramount in the 1940s and they had a deep friendship and an easy camaraderie that comes through in The Deep Six. Bendix was a cut above a lot of the other character actors at Paramount, whereas he may have been doing character roles at Paramount, from the mid 40s on he was a popular radio and then TV star with his Life of Riley series.

The rest of the cast fills their roles out nicely. James Whitmore, Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., Dianne Foster, and especially Keenan Wynn as the ship's hardnosed executive officer who is Ladd's chief tormentor. Look for Joey Bishop in a small role as one of the sailors.

Well worth watching

[amazeika · 7/10 · 5 July 2009]

I could not disagree more with CHRIS from South Adelaide who I feel really gave this film short shrift. Alec Austen is a commercial artist and Naval reservist called to active duty in WWII. Having long forsaken his Quaker upbringing he is thus completely blindsided when after reporting for duty on a destroyer he finds himself seriously conflicted regarding the taking of life. Alan Ladd, though in decline personally and professionally at this point in his life, is, nevertheless, very good as the troubled Alec. This film is further buoyed by an absolutely outstanding supporting cast including: James Whitmore, Keenan Wynn, William Bendix, Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., Jeanette Nolan and Joey Bishop. Other familiar faces include Perry Lopez,(Cowhand Pete Ramirez in THE LONE RANGER movie and a crewman in MR. ROBERTS) and Ross Bagdasarian who, aided by his chipmunks Alvin, Simon & Theodore, would later gain recording and TV fame as David Seville. The storyline is also unique in that the main WWII theater of operations setting is the Northeast Pacific and the Aleutians. Director Rudolph Mate's other credits as Director or Director of Photography include GILDA, SAHARA (1943) and PRIDE OF THE YANKEES. Alas, it has not yet found it's way to DVD. THE DEEP SIX is not SAVING PRIVATE RYAN or TWELVE O'CLOCK HIGH, it is a solid production worthy of a look.

Last Pairing of Ladd and Bendix

[gordonl56 · 6/10 · 22 May 2016]

THE DEEP SIX 1958

This 1958 film was a co-production between Warner Brothers and Alan Ladd's Jaguar Productions. The film is a WW2 drama with Alan Ladd in the lead. The rest of the cast includes, James Whitmore, Keenan Wynn, Efrem Zimbalist Jr, Dianne Foster, William Bendix and Joey Bishop.

Alan Ladd plays ad artist who works for an agency in New York. He has the hots for his boss, Dianne Foster. Ladd makes a few moves on the pretty Miss Foster, but, before he can close the deal, he gets a letter calling him up for service. Ladd is a member of the Navy reserve and is assigned to a destroyer.

Now we find out that Ladd is from a Quaker family, and has been raised to avoid doing harm to another person. Ladd has not been a practising Quaker for years. He joins his ship and is welcomed aboard by the Captain, James Whitmore. The welcome is far less friendly from the executive officer, Keenan Wynn. Wynn is not pleased with the fact that Ladd is a Quaker. Wynn is a bitter man having been at Pearl Harbor on December 7th. He had lost family when the USS ARIZONA had been sunk.

Ladd is put in charge of a twin 40 mm anti-aircraft mount. His gun crew includes, Joey Bishop, (in his 1st role) Perry Lopez and Ross Bagdasarian. Also in the mix here is William Bendix as a Chief Petty Officer and Efrem Zimbalist Jr as the ship's doctor.

Every chance Wynn has he insults Ladd, or complains to the Captain that Ladd will let them down in combat. This of course wears on Ladd causing inner conflict over his personal values. The ship stops off in San Francisco where Ladd gets a surprise leave. And who is waiting for him there? Miss Foster of course. She has fallen for Ladd and wants to introduce him to her family who just happen to live down the coast.

Everything is going nicely when Foster's sister, Barbara Eiler, gets news that her husband was lost in combat. The man had been on a ship that went down off Guadalcanal. Ladd now feels guilty about asking Foster to marry him. He tells her that they must wait till the war is over.

Ladd's ship is now sent to Dutch Harbor in the Aleutian Islands. Ladd's problems come to a head, when a he can't bring himself to order his gun crew to fire on an approaching aircraft. It turns out to be an American plane, so no big deal. Ladd though goes to the Captain and tells him of his hesitation to fire. Ladd is taken off the gun and assigned to damage control. Wynn in now convinced he has been right about Ladd the whole time.

Ladd shows that he is no coward when the ship is hit by a bomb during a Japanese air raid. The bomb fails to explode, so Ladd, along with William Bendix dig the thing out from between decks. They haul it topside and toss it overboard, where it explodes.

The ship is now sent to pick up the crew of a downed recon plane stranded on one of the Japanese held, Aleutian Islands. Ladd volunteers to lead the rescue party ashore. The mission quickly goes sideways as the Japanese put in an unwanted appearance. There is a brisk battle with Ladd calling in supporting fire from the destroyer.

Petty Officer Bendix is wounded forcing Ladd to decide to kill, or be killed. He uses his Thompson to mow down a group of attacking Japanese, collecting a round himself in the exchange. They cart Bendix and the rescued airmen back to the ship. Bendix does not make it back. The ship returns to San Francisco where the wounded Ladd is discharged into the waiting arms of Miss Foster.

While all this has been going on, the ship's doctor, Zimbalist, has discovered that the exc, Wynn, has been stealing morphine from the drug locker. He has been self-medicating over a stomach problem.

The film was directed by former cinematographer turned helmsman, Rudolph Mate. The 5 time Oscar nominated (Gilda, Sahara, Cover Girl, etc.) Mate cranked out several solid westerns and film noir as a director. These include DOA, THE DARK PAST, SIEGE AT RED RIVER, THE VIOLENT MEN and UNION STATION.

The cinematography here was handled by Ladd favourite, John F Seitz. Seitz would be the director of photography on 22 diff Ladd films. Among these, SAIGON, CALCUTTA, THE GREAT GATSBY, APPOINTMENT WITH DANGER, BOTNAY BAY, THE BIG LAND and THIS GUN FOR HIRE. He also shot, DOUBLE INDEMNITY, THE LOST WEEKEND, SUNSET BLVD and THE BIG CLOCK. Seitz received 7 Oscar nominations over his 1916 to 1960 career.

The film suffers from a rather meandering script which has little to do with the source novel by, Martin Dibner. The changes from the novel (which I have read) are not for the better. The usually reliable Mate seems somewhat "lost at sea" here. The cast are all okay, though Ladd is really a bit old for the part. (and I'm a Ladd fan) The film needed to be tightened up and cut down from the 108 minute run time. Worth a watch, but is not one of Ladd's better films.

This was the seventh time William Bendix and Alan Ladd appeared in the same film. Both would die in 1964, Ladd at 50 and Bendix at age 58.

Better than average for one of Ladd's later films.

[planktonrules · 7/10 · 1 September 2014]

Towards the tail end of his career, the quality of Alan Ladd's films slipped significantly. Oddly, despite his success in "Shane" (1953), his successive films became increasingly formulaic and weak. I am not completely sure why. Because of this, I was happy with seeing "Deep Six" because although it wasn't a great film, it was a very good one and an improvement over his usual movie from this period in his career.

In this film, Ladd plays a Quaker serving in the Navy during WWII. Unlike his usual pugnacious persona, this character is more thoughtful and quiet than you would expect. His religious faith and his duty become a significant problem, as he finds that he does have difficulty killing. How's he going to work all this out? With his good buddy Frenchie (William Bendix).

Bendix is a common actor in Alan Ladd films and they were in about a half dozen films together. However, they were never better together than in this film--mostly because Bendix's character was really well written and fun to watch. Unfortunately, not all the other characters are as multidimensional and the film, oddly, leaves Frenchie's fate a bit in doubt--for this, the film loses a point. Otherwise, entertaining and with some unexpected depth.

By the way, the history teacher in me was irritated that the clothing and hairstyles on the women were clearly mid-1950s--not at all the sorts you'd have seen during WWII. This was sloppy--as well as the poor use of stock footage where a Japanese plane switched from silver to green in mid-flight!!

Great flick for a Saturday Matinée

[Homer900 · 7/10 · 4 January 2008]

I remember this as the second of a two part feature on a Saturday afternoon in the early 60s. That was when movie tickets were .35 cents and the loges were 50 cents. Of course, after the lights went out, we'd sneak into the loges.

Since we boys were raised on the stories of our fathers' and uncles' war experiences, it was natural for us to watch these movies. One uncle in particular was a career Navy man and so we knew nautical terminology and such.

It was a routine story with good action sequences. One thing in particular that has always stuck with me after viewing this was when SPOILER: Alan Ladd's character finally starts to shoot the Japanese soldiers. END SPOILER.

A cheer went up throughout the theater and everyone, mostly young boys, were cheering and clapping. Having seen it since, I realize that it is nothing but a routine war picture with little in the way of exploring truly the cost of war to individuals, but it will always have a fond place in my heart from my original viewing oh so many years ago.

An interesting side note. This movie, along with others is listed on an old handbill from the old Parks AFB near Dublin California. The bill is dated 1952. The day and dates are listed of the showings. In checking IMDb, this movie shows as a 1958 release. All of the other titles also show a 1958 release, but in checking the calendar, both 1952 and 1958 the dates all fall on the same days. Weird.

Good cast in otherwise routine war movie

[rollo_tomaso · 6/10 · 13 May 2001]

The cast is terrific, especially the always under-appreciated Dianne Foster in a thankless role, and the dialogue is crisp. But most of the cast is considerably older than their roles, and this movie adds little new information. If you like character-study war movies, this is a good time. I give it 6/10.

Seven seas to peace of mind

[dbdumonteil · 5 June 2010]

The very subject of the movie eludes the director.The movie looks like some kind of cross between "Friendly Persuasion" (Wyler)and "the Caine Mutiny" (Dmytryk) Like Anthony Perkins in Wyler's movie,Alan Ladd's mom is a quaker and he was brought up that way and carefully taught;unfortunately he does not know where he stands anymore and whether he should or should not kill.Which is not that easy when you are in the navy.

The lieutenant Commander,portrayed by Keenan Wynn ,recalls sometimes Humphrey Bogart in "the Caine Mutiny" ,(and also Richard Dix in Robson's "the ghost ship" )with his obsession with authority -he began his career as a private whereas Ladd went to college and became a reserve officer-Too bad the character is underwritten.

The best does not come,IMHO,from the main plot ,but from the subplots:Frenchy,his missus and his Edith we get to know in a way,is an endearing character ,well played by William Bendix;the death of the two children's father is told with a great simplicity ,avoiding the maudlin side of melodrama;Private Aaron provides the comic relief with his numerous Armenian cousins;and there's a good scene between the Navy and the merchant marine about a jukebox.

The Deep Six 1958

[silvershadows-09863 · 7/10 · 16 June 2020]

I recently read the Bev Linet book on Alan Ladd. The book consistently talks about Alan's decline at Warner Bros. The problem with that is the half dozen of his post Paramount pictures I've seen have all been good. Linet's book, written in the 1970's, uses the old New York Times reviews as reference. The trouble there is the Times seemed to hate movies, not just Alan Ladd's. So when you are basing his films on Times reviews and not watching the actual films, you might be off target.

This is a good film. It looks good. The star looks good. It's not 1942 Ladd. But he's trim and fit. The supporting cast is excellent and deep. William Bendix; Keenan Wynn; James Whitmore; Efrem Zimbalist Jr,; Peter Hansen and Joey Bishop. All brings something to the story and their roles. The romance is believable. It's right to have Diane Foster, a 30 year old executive, engaged to another man in the beginning. Too many films gloss the romantic subplot and pretend a beautiful 30 year old woman has waited her whole life for "The man of her dreams" to appear.

The plot is simple but interesting. Ladd plays a commercial artist of a Quaker upbringing. He's a reserve Navy Lieutenant who is called to service during WW2. His superior officer doesn't like Ladd's religious background and fears he won't deliver when needed. Events conspire to make other sailors also question if Ladd can be depended on in action. Will he come through, when needed most?

Alan was a sensitive actor. When he was at ease he was brilliant. For example, with Van Heflin in Shane. His scenes with Bill Bendix here are of the same class. Two old friends back together doing what they do best. Entertaining the public.

Learning to Kill

[wes-connors · 5/10 · 27 May 2013]

Raised by a peace-loving Quaker mother, artist Alan Ladd (as Alexander "Alec" Austen) is nevertheless enlisted for World War II service. This interrupts his romance with attractive younger Dianne Foster (as Susan Cahill). In the Navy, Mr. Ladd meets a typical group of movie sailors. These include frequent co-star William Bendix (as "Frenchy" Shapiro), secretive Keenan Wynn (as Mike Edge), commander James Whitmore (as Warren Meredith) and roommate Efrem Zimbalist Jr. (as Doctor Blanchard). Stand up comic Joey Bishop plays an oddly attractive young sailor, and future "Alvin and the Chipmunks" creator Ross Bagdasarian provides the crew with dozens of Armenian woman. Ladd is made gunnery officer, but his pacifist past causes him to freeze when it's time to shoot. Ladd must learn how to kill or put his crew in danger...

***** The Deep Six (1/15/58) Rudolph Mate ~ Alan Ladd, William Bendix, Dianne Foster, Joey Bishop

Kill Or Be Killed.

[rmax304823 · 5/10 · 30 May 2011]

This story of a Quaker gunnery officer on a Navy destroyer in World War II bears some resemblance to Howard Hawks' "Sergeant York" but not much. Will Allan Ladd manage to overcome his unwillingness to fire at the enemy and save the lives of his shipmates? Well, it seems to be an on-again off-again switch with Ladd, unlike Sergeant York who simply rendered unto Caesar those things that were Caesar's.

Ladd's story seems to be laid out according to the numbers. We first get to know him as an interesting guy, introducing his girl friend (who is completely dispensable) to Amer Picon, a Basque liqueur rarely found in America these days.

Ladd may be adventurous in his taste for liquor and, for all we know, his taste in women, but he's not anxious to shoot at an unidentified aircraft when they're at sea. The men disparage him. One of the officers, Keenan Wynne, hates him. His only supporter seems to be "Frenchy" Shapiro, an unlikely character played by William Bendix. Bendix was in real life an old friend of Ladd's by this time. The conflict is cleared up during a landing party in the Aleutian Islands, in which Frenchy is killed and Ladd wounded.

The script was partly written by Harry Brown who was responsible for some genuinely unusual -- even arty -- dialog in "A Walk In The Sun." But here it's no better than average. The funny banter among the enlisted men is silly rather than funny. The supporting players mostly do their jobs professionally but Ladd himself adds nothing. He was never a bravura performer and no one expects him to be. But he was doing a lot of booze and barbiturates during this period and although he was only in his 40s he looked puffy eyed and creaky. There's a terrible scene towards the end, when he and Bendix are being brought back to the ship in a lifeboat. Bendix dies in his arms and Ladd can't quite grasp the fact. He goes on mumbling to the dead body and when told that Bendix is gone, he says aloud, "Frenchy? Dead?" And he doesn't sound dazed with pain or shock. He sounds plastered.

It's a little painful to watch Ladd walk his way through this routine script because, given a certain undemanding kind of role, he could be quite good. But everything seems to jar in this film. Dutch Harbor in the Aleutians has never seen bright, sunny weather like this. Even the model work in "Destination Tokyo" went to the trouble of simulating the cold and the dreary fog.

I guess the message is supposed to be that some things are worth killing for. But, in the worst moment of the film, the hortative notion goes beyond that -- somewhere into the realm of "killing others is fun." Ladd and Bendix are making their escape from a Japanese-held island. Most of the enemy patrol is killed, but one wounded Japanese soldier wanders out into the open, a few feet away. Bendix raises his Tommy gun, then hesitates, grins, nudges Ladd and gestures that Ladd should have the privilege and fun of shooting and killing a wounded enemy. Killing wounded enemy soldiers and airmen was routine on both sides in the Pacific theater, but turning it into the equivalent of an amusement park ride is something else.

Made a big impression on me as a kid

[redjackco · 8/10 · 8 December 2007]

THE DEEP SIX made a big impression on me as a kid. (I don't recall seeing more than bits and pieces since then.) At that time, World War II movies were big, as were afternoon matinees. After watching this we turned a friend's backyard tree into a submarine conning tower, which gave us hours and hours of play.

Two scenes I particularly remember:

One is when the Japanese, on the pretext of surrendering on a beach, have a machine gun hidden on the back of one of their soldiers. Suddenly he bends over and the guy behind him opens fire with the machine gun, mowing down the helpless and gullible Yanks.

And of course the key scene is when the conscientious objector, played by Alan Ladd, finally fires his gun in defense of his fellow soldiers.

8 out of 10 for the fond memories of youth....

Fun to watch just to play guess the actor.

[miles_to_go_before · 3/10 · 29 May 2011]

This movie was really quite bad. No action, the conflicts were not well dramatized. Alan Ladd did not seem to be giving much of an effort here at all. He looked about 15 years older than his 45 years. However, there are a lot of famous actors in it and only fun part of this was in guessing their names. "Hey, that was Jerry(the beaver) Mathers!" From beginning to end this movie never really got off the ground. The pacing seemed very slow and if I'm not mistaken it was done with a small budget. At one point the destroyer they were on changed to an aircraft carrier during a Japanese strafing run. All the action scenes and scenes were rushed and seemed uninteresting. William Bendix was probably the best of the bunch at the time. The story lines of the side characters were never developed to a point where anyone could care about them.

Plodding and boring

[buystuffrnh · 5/10 · 29 January 2020]

With the exception of William Bendix and James Whitmore the performance of the cast is flat. Alan Ladd sleepwalks through the picture as if he would rather be somewhere else. Film does not achieve its goal of exploring the inner turmoil between the Quaker beliefs and the need to fight in war.

See the Movie, Then Go Read the Book

[pv71989-1 · 5/10 · 31 August 2014]

"The Deep Six" is a standard World War II actioner with credible performances almost torpedoed (pun intended) by Hollywood's need for sap, melodrama and comic relief.

The film is based loosely on the bestselling novel of the same name by Martin Dibner. "Loose" is being kind. I recommend reading the book and only viewing the movie as a way to pass a few hours until the rain stops.

Alan Ladd, who would die six years after this movie came out, plays Lt. Austen, a pacifist Quaker who, nonetheless, joins the Navy. He is sent aboard a destroyer as an assistant gunnery officer (a point made in the book, but left out of the movie). He spends the movie trying to overcome his pacifist ways, finally "being forced" to kill Japanese soldiers to save his shipmates. Alas, the whole moral quandary comes across as placid and lacks energy, much as Ladd's career was by the mid-50's.

Ably supported by a veteran cast that includes James Whitmore, Keenan Wynn, Efrem Zimbalist Jr., Perry Lopez ("Chinatown"), Nestor Paiva, William Bendix and Joey Bishop in his film debut. Look quick for Jerry Mathers (no, not as the Beaver), Ross Bagdasarian (better known as Dave Seville of "Alvin & the Chipmunks" fame), Robert ("Hideous Sun Demon") Clarke and Edd "Kookie" Byrnes without his comb.

Though director Rudolph Mate does a good job with what he has, he is saddled with the book of Hollywood clichés. Bishop's character was added for comic relief as a womanizing sailor with a gal in every port. A hard-nosed officer acts the way he does because he is dying of cancer and wants to get a few of "them" before he dies, so he is forgiven for berating Austen and the crew. Austen leads a rescue mission so he can get the chance to overcome his pacifism under fire. Yada, yada, yada.

The best way to describe this movie is "cowardly." It fails to explore any of the themes portrayed in the 1953 novel. Author Dibner based the book on his own exploits aboard the cruiser USS Richmond during the Aleutian Islands campaign.

His book is almost just name only for the movie. A big reason is that Alan Ladd is one of the producers. By 1958, his career was on a downward slide because he refused to transition into older or supporting roles. He changed the movie to make his character virtually the only conflict in the movie.

Case in point, in that book, Wynn's hard-nosed LCDR Mike Edge is Lt. Mike Edge, a sexual predator of sailors, as well as a virulent racist. Whitemore's commanding officer character is a coward forced back to sea because he makes too many enemies ashore. Austen has Quaker parents but does not espouse their beliefs. Zimbalist's Doc Blanchard is a drunkard.

Slobodjian (Bagdasarian) actually lives to the end of the movie and is instrumental in stopping Edge. In the movie, he is rarely shown and gets killed before the halfway mark.

Most egregious of all, the character of Henry Fowler, a black steward who is actually the best gunner on a ship (a cruiser in the book) desperate for gunners, is completely eliminated. Racism keeps him from getting that job until Austen convinces Meredith to let the man be a gunner during combat and a steward the rest of the time. But, Edge goads him into violence and tries to murder him twice. You can almost see an actor like James Edwards, Ossie Davis or Woody Strode in the role.

The book explored racism, homosexual rape (present but always covered up in the Navy), archaic customs and practices that hampered the Navy during the early years of the war, the simmering resentment felt by Naval Academy graduates toward Navy ROTC and Officer Candidate School- commissioned officers and the continued decision of Naval brass to put unfit or undeserving officers in positions of authority.

Also, the movie ends with a whimper of a mission, namely the one with Austen going on a secret rescue mission on a Japanese-held island in the Aleutians. In the book, the cruiser participates in the real-life Battle of the Komandorski Islands, which would have been a far greater climax for the movie.

Overall, the film, as I've said, is okay. Joey Bishop's humor gets stale after a while (which is probably why he was always on the fringes of the Rat Pack). You also lose interest in Austen's pacifism, which becomes as interesting as his two-dimensional romance with Dianne Foster (in the book, it was central to Austen keeping his sanity).

This is not a movie worth seeking out, but rather one to catch on TCM during an Alan Ladd marathon.

Maybe one day, Hollywood will finally make a movie based on the book and not just the title.

Deep 6 Explores Deep Emotions ***1/2

[edwagreen · 8/10 · 17 January 2011]

This film is quite good. The romance element quickly gives way to an interesting story of World War 11 where Alan Ladd's Quaker faith is put to test in battle.

As Frenchy Shapiro, William Bendix etched an unforgettable character. He uses Yiddish expressions interchangeably and gives a robust comic and dramatic performances. His facial expressions and comic timing were very similar to what he gave us in the memorable television series Life of Riley.

Keenan Wynn plays a bigoted naval officer who harbors a major secret. James Whitmore, always excellent in war pictures, is rather subdued here as a naval commander.

This is a story of the human spirit, bravery and a spirit that got us through the war years.

average war flick

[SnoopyStyle · 5/10 · 12 August 2023]

Alexander 'Alec' Austen (Alan Ladd) flirts with Susan Cahill (Dianne Foster). They work at an ad agency on Madison Avenue. It's September '42. He is called back to active duty in the Navy. He's a Quaker and has pacifist leanings. He struggles with his beliefs in the midst of the war.

My initial issue is Alan Ladd's age. He's in his mid-forties. It's a little old to be so conflicted in his beliefs. It's an interesting subject matter, but the movie is struggling to handle it. I don't know what he's doing in the Navy anyways. It would make more sense if he got drafted, but he's at the upper most age. He seems to be a lapsed Quaker, but he never says it outright. Maybe the point is that everyone is supposed to fight or there are no pacifists in the foxhole. Edge is too overly hateful. This ends up being an average war movie in its execution. That would be fine, but the interesting subject matter is lost in a muddle.

Good cast who could do this rubbish in their sleep, and did!

[Asgardian · 1/10 · 18 May 2002]

The cast turned up just to collect a paycheck, which is a shame, because it is a fine collection of actors. However this movie is representative of tired scripting and even worse, tired and uninspired directing. Alan Ladd looks almost embarrassed on occasions to be associated with this turkey. This film is only worthwhile to make you appreciate when you see a quality movie of the genre.

BEVARE (sorry Bela) watch this stinker at your own risk.

Closeted pacifist predictably proves his mettle in World War II

[Turfseer · 5/10 · 28 February 2022]

Released in 1958, The Deep Six is both a romance and World War II drama starring Alan Ladd as Alexander "Alec" Austen, a lieutenant in the Naval Reserves called up for active duty during World War II.

Ladd, almost 45 at the time, seems too old for the part and I had trouble buying the idea that Susan Cahill (the love interest here) played by Dianne Foster (around 30 when the film was made) would so easily fall for the somewhat haggard, older-looking Ladd (this was six years before the actor's death due to an alcohol and drug overdose).

The romance between Alec and Susan which ends in marriage represents a sub-plot which has little to do with the main narrative which takes place on a US Navy Destroyer.

While the machinations aboard the ship prove to be a standard familiar story, the internal arc of the protagonist proves anything but routine. And that is the influence of Alec's Quaker upbringing on whether he really is fit to be a soldier. The narrative presents a series of tests that Alec must undergo before we discover whether he can overcome his disdain for killing during combat.

The first "trial by fire" involves his commanding officer Lt. Comdr. Mike Edge (Keenan Wynn) who ridicules him for his Quaker background and suggesting that he's really a conscientious objector at heart. Fortunately for Alec, the Commander of the ship, Warren Meredith (a solid James Whitmore) will have none of Edge's bigotry and continually reminds him how unprofessional he is.

It's Edge who again berates Alec for his humane treatment of German U-boat survivors and asks him if he has the ability to "hate" at all-a necessary component in combat as Edge sees it.

Alec fails the test when he "freezes" and fails to give an order to shoot down what appears to be an enemy plane. Lucky for him the plane was American but Meredith transfers Alec to damage control after he admits that fear overtook him during the crucial moment of decision.

Alec's reputation is restored after removing an unexploded bomb below deck along with his pal "Frenchy" Shapiro (William Bendix playing a Jewish Chief Petty Officer of all roles).

Alec proves his mettle further during a fistfight with a group of Merchant Marines while the ship is docked in Dutch Harbor, Alaska.

Wholly predictable, we discover that Alec "had it in him" all along. During a mission to save stranded airmen on a Japanese-held island, Alec kills a group of Japanese soldiers to save both himself and Frenchy who come under attack. Unfortunately, Frenchy is severely wounded but does not survive.

In addition to the stellar cast of principals, the ship's crew is made up of various ethnic types with Joey Bishop playing Ensign Ski Krokowski in his first film role.

Ultimately. I couldn't get too excited about Alec's inner conflict as you can predict from the start what is going to happen. Perhaps the character of Alec is just a little too earnest and proper without much of an edge. There's enough action here to keep your interest but in addition to Alec's flat internal arc, the romance sub-plot also bogs the narrative down to the point where everything becomes rather predictable.

Very Good Late Alan Ladd Film.

[januszlvii · 8/10 · 9 December 2021]

Very good late Alan Ladd film. The best part of the movie was the scenes involving Lieutenant Alec Austin ( Ladd) and Frenchy Shapiro ( William Bendix) Bendix, who appeared in two of Ladd's best films The Glass Key and The Blue. Dahllia, and once again they worked well. You can tell Ladd enjoyed making the film, he smiled a lot ( except for The Badlanders rare for a Ladd film). One scene stood out. Ladd drawing Bendix's picture ( it was for his 8 year old daughter),. It was a very different kind of a scene thst you see from Ladd, and it shows he was not always the tough guy/action hero ( although that is what Ladd fans enjoyed best). I give it 8/10 stars. Again a very good late Alan Ladd film.

Paradise Cove

[geraldrgreene · 3 September 2021]

Early scenes : French Restaurant and Ladd's Beach House are Paradise Cove, Malibu area.