Robert Aldrich brings this grim story set in the latter stages of World War 2 and conflict in a battalion where Captain Cooney sends men on a mission but is too cowardly to bail them out with firepower as he does not want to die.
The film stars Jack Palance as the tougher subordinate Costa who has seen through Eddie Albert's cowardly and drunk Captain Cooney who has used his family connections with Lee Marvin's Lt Colonel Bartlett to get himself a nice number but finds himself out of his depth and quickly losing the respect of his men.
From the opening scenes, filmed in a studio back-lot of RKO you can sense this is a low budget film. What we have is a film with some of cinema's hard men Marvin and Palance (both to be future Oscar winners) slightly playing against type. Palance is a good guy here, the platoon leader cynical about his masters. You can see ingrained in his face that he is battle worn, battle weary and sick of his superiors treating his men like some disposal commodity.
Marvin plays an effective cameo. He knows Cooney is inept, he has known him for years and he a lot to be thankful to Cooney's father. When Marvin goes back home after the war he needs his father's patronage. Maybe he really did feel in the heat of battle either Cooney will man up, get killed by the enemy or even by one of his own men.
William Smithers plays Lt Woodruff torn between his loyalty to Costa and dislike of Cooney but bound not to rock the boat but raises his concerns with Bartlett, but Bartlett dismisses his concerns as he has his own agenda.
As the film is an adaptation of a stage play, it does have too many stereotypes and rather one dimensional ones. Robert Strauss is there for broad comic relief for example.
Only Smithers comes across as conflicted where his plea to save Costa and his men when they go on a mission are rebuffed by Cooney and feels he has nowhere else to turn.
The climax of the film comes across as weak and preachy. The conflict with the German tanks does not look well staged and the incident with Costa falls victim to censorship laws where the violence had to be toned down.
I felt that the ending need to be punchier and more to the point which the showdown between Smithers and Marvin failed to bring.
Its still a film with some powerhouse performances and a good contrast to the more gung ho war films of the time.
The film stars Jack Palance as the tougher subordinate Costa who has seen through Eddie Albert's cowardly and drunk Captain Cooney who has used his family connections with Lee Marvin's Lt Colonel Bartlett to get himself a nice number but finds himself out of his depth and quickly losing the respect of his men.
From the opening scenes, filmed in a studio back-lot of RKO you can sense this is a low budget film. What we have is a film with some of cinema's hard men Marvin and Palance (both to be future Oscar winners) slightly playing against type. Palance is a good guy here, the platoon leader cynical about his masters. You can see ingrained in his face that he is battle worn, battle weary and sick of his superiors treating his men like some disposal commodity.
Marvin plays an effective cameo. He knows Cooney is inept, he has known him for years and he a lot to be thankful to Cooney's father. When Marvin goes back home after the war he needs his father's patronage. Maybe he really did feel in the heat of battle either Cooney will man up, get killed by the enemy or even by one of his own men.
William Smithers plays Lt Woodruff torn between his loyalty to Costa and dislike of Cooney but bound not to rock the boat but raises his concerns with Bartlett, but Bartlett dismisses his concerns as he has his own agenda.
As the film is an adaptation of a stage play, it does have too many stereotypes and rather one dimensional ones. Robert Strauss is there for broad comic relief for example.
Only Smithers comes across as conflicted where his plea to save Costa and his men when they go on a mission are rebuffed by Cooney and feels he has nowhere else to turn.
The climax of the film comes across as weak and preachy. The conflict with the German tanks does not look well staged and the incident with Costa falls victim to censorship laws where the violence had to be toned down.
I felt that the ending need to be punchier and more to the point which the showdown between Smithers and Marvin failed to bring.
Its still a film with some powerhouse performances and a good contrast to the more gung ho war films of the time.