ROPE OF SAND

Burt Lancaster and Peter Lorre

ROPE OF SAND (1949). Director: William Dieterle. Colorized. 

Mike Davis (Burt Lancaster) is an African guide whose charge, Ingram (Hayden Rourke), goes off into forbidden diamond territory while he's sleeping. When Davis finds him, Ingram is near-death, clutching a load of diamonds. Davis leaves the diamonds and tries to get Ingram out of the desert. When police guards, led by Commandant Paul Vogel (Paul Henreid), come upon the pair, Ingram is dead and Davis is tortured, but refuses to tell where the diamonds are located. Two years later Davis is back in the territory, where diamond mogul Martingale (Claude Rains), who pretends to like Vogel but secretly despises him, decides to use a beautiful refuge, Suzanne (Corinne Calvet of Flight to Tangier), to get the location of the diamonds from Davis. A battle of wills ensues between Davis and Vogel as they fight it out for both diamonds and lady, with Martingale manipulating everyone behind the scenes and Toady (Peter Lorre) hoping to score as well. Meanwhile, Davis has decided to go for the gems come hell or highwater ... 

Claude Rains and Corinne Calvet

Rope of Sand is a seriously flawed film, but it is entertaining and well-acted enough to prove a good watch. There seems to be so much missing of the characters' back stories that while you're watching it you think it must be based on a long novel, not all of which made it onto the screen, but this is not the case. This was supposed to be a follow-up to Casablanca with Bogart and Bergman in the Lancaster and Calvet roles, but producer Hal Wallis had to be satisfied with three of the supporting cast of that film. John Bromfield (of The Big Bluff) has a smaller role as one of Henreid's officers. Dieterle's direction is assured, the performances -- especially Rains' -- are uniformly good, there is outstanding cinematography from Charles Lang [Wild is the Wind]  and an exciting score by Franz Waxman, but you may find it hard to tell if there's more -- or less -- here than meets the eye. Lancaster and Henreid have a nifty fist fight at one point. 

Verdict: Certainly it's not boring. ***.  

SERIOUS CHARGE

Andrew Ray, Sarah Churchill, Anthony Quayle

SERIOUS CHARGE (1959). Director: Terence Young. 

Reverend Howard Phillips (Anthony Quayle of Tarzan's Greatest Adventure) lives with his wise, feisty mother (Irene Browne) at the vicarage. Hester Peters (Sarah Churchill of Royal Wedding) is an aging spinster who is almost desperately in love with him. One of the parishioners, Mary (Leigh Madison of The Giant Behemoth), has been knocked up by juvenile delinquent Larry (Andrew Ray), who now wants nothing to do with her. Rejected by Howard, Hester has a bad reaction, especially when she sees Mary coming out of a back door of the vicarage. But just when you're thinking Howard will be accused of fathering Mary's child, the picture -- based on a play by Philip King -- pulls a neat twist: Larry accuses bachelor Howard of "interfering" with -- in other words, molesting -- him in the latter's study. Hester backs up Larry, and now Howard is subjected to a whole barrage of homophobic poison pen letters and more. But Mrs. Philips isn't going to take this lying down ... 

Quayle with Churchill

Thanks to a swift pace and some excellent performances, especially from Quayle, Serious Charge, despite some dated aspects, emerges a credible, entertaining and fairly frank British drama. The juvenile delinquents seem a little too much like the Hollywood version, and due to the casting of singer Cliff Richard, "introduced" in the movie, scenes of the kids dancing as if they were on a TV show look like very weird production numbers -- Richard even sings on more than one occasion. Fortunately, these scenes don't ruin the movie. Of all the things Larry -- played with marvelous sleaziness by Ray -- could have accused Howard of, what he chooses makes one wonder what put it into his mind in the first place. As for Howard's sexuality, this fifties film remains mum on that although Howard's mum seems convinced he only needs a good woman. Well ... This was an early film for director Young, most famous for Dr. No and Thunderball. Percy Herbert of Mysterious Island plays Larry's father. 

Verdict: Fine acting, a good script, makes this a worthwhile watch despite its flaws. ***.   

SADDLE ACES OF THE CINEMA

SADDLE ACES OF THE CINEMA. Buck Rainey. A. S. Barnes; 1980.

In this very interesting volume, Rainey looks back at the cowboy heroes of yesteryear, from the silent era to the mid-fifties when television took over from the B movie westerns that proliferated before the "boob tube" became ascendant. The book is much more interesting than I first imagined, because Rainey's prose is quite good and he unearths a lot of interesting information on these mostly forgotten movie stars. The names of Tom Mix and Gene Autry [The Phantom Empire]  and a couple of others may be familiar to the casual reader, and we've also got the likes of Ken Maynard, Hoot Gibson, Rex Bell, Harry Carey [The Vanishing Legion], Buck Jones, Jack Holt [Holt of the Secret Service] and others. Many of these gentlemen went on to successful careers as character actors in westerns, serials and other genres. The book is packed with black and white illustrations, a complete list of each actor's film credits, as well as lots of biographical information. If nothing else the book makes it clear how fleeting fame can be, but each man had many, many devoted fans in their day.

Verdict: For western fans and film enthusiasts. ***. 

THE RED CIRCLE

The mysterious "red circle" with Renate Ewert

THE RED CIRCLE (aka Der rote Kreis/1960). Director: Jurgen Roland.

A condemned man is saved from the guillotine because the executioner forgets to remove the nail that keeps the blade from descending. Sent to Devil's Island, he escapes and takes up residence in London as the hooded criminal mastermind the Red Circle (who resembles the Shadow). Chief Inspector Parr of Scotland Yard (Karl-Georg Saebisch) and bumbling assistant Haggett (Eddi Arent) are out to stop him as he makes his way through numerous victims including Lady Dorringham (Edith Mill) and Mr. Beardmore (Alfred Schlageter). The latter's handsome nephew, Jack Beardmore (Thomas Alder), is carrying on a romance with suspected jewel thief Thalia Drummond (Renate Ewert) and becomes a suspect along with several others. Meanwhile slick private eye Derrick Yale (Klausjurgen Wussow) does his best to help Inspector Parr, who is given a deadline to unmask the Red Circle or else. 

Thomas Alder, Karl-Georg Saebisch, Klausjurgen Wussow

The Red Circle is another adaptation of an Edgar Wallace story made in West Germany. It is one of the best examples of the genre. Suspenseful, fast-paced, well-acted, and exciting, it maintains suspense and has several surprises, including a couple of twists at the end. True, not everything is cleared up and the resolutions may confuse you, but the whole thing is so damn entertaining it doesn't really matter. Renate Ewert makes a wonderful impression as the irrepressible Thalia who keeps you guessing as to exactly whose side she's on. Tragically, both she and Thomas Alder committed suicide while in their early thirties. 

Verdict: Top-notch West German thriller or Krimi. ***.

ONE TOO MANY

Ruth Warrick contemplates her next drink

ONE TOO MANY (1950). Director: Erle C. Kenton.

Helen Mason (Ruth Warrick of Guest in the House) was once a well-known concert pianist who gave it up when she married reporter Bob (Richard Travis of The Man Who Came to Dinner) and had a daughter named Ginger (Ginger Prince). She has substituted booze for her career while Bob is what Dr. Phil would call an "enabler." Helen is convinced she is not an alcoholic and can get off the sauce without going to AA. But in this she is kidding herself. Helen and Bob find their lives spiraling out of control as Helen not only continues to drink but to drive drunk, endangering herself, her daughter, and everyone else on the road ... 

The Harmonaires pad out the running time

One Too Many probably has its heart in the right place although its polemical approach to the material is not as dramatic as intended. Much of the movie has Bob and others arguing that alcoholism is a disease that needs treatment and special hospital wings, dismissing the notion that all addicts are just weak-willed drunks of low character. Unfortunately these sequences turn the movie into a lecture that makes some good points but is not terribly entertaining. Strangely, the movie is padded with a long concert sequence at the end when the black group the Harmonaires do three numbers, and Warrick plays "The Minute Waltz" and a more contemporary number on the piano in a nightclub. 

An enabler? Richard Travis

Warrick gives a good performance in this although she's not the kind of riveting actress who can give an added bite to the picture a la Stanwyck or Crawford. Travis is, as usual, likable and pleasant and laid-back even when his world seems to be falling apart. William Tracy, who plays a photographer, is given a long, tedious sequence -- more padding -- as he waits outside the window in the maternity ward where his wife is having a baby. Ginger Prince is a talented child actress who can also sing and dance. Rhys Williams, Mary Young, Thurston Hall, and Victor Kilian are all good as Sully the bartender and his wife, newspaper publisher Simes, who hates drunks, and Emery, a mayoral candidate who gets caught in an inebriated state in a bar. Larry J. Blake is fine as Helen's old friend, bandleader Walt Williams. Erm Westmore appears briefly to give Warrick a makeover. Little did audiences of 1950 know that the scourge of drugs would almost replace alcoholism as a social ill. Erle C. Kenton also directed Why Men Leave Home, which also has Westmore and Prince in it and is even worse. From Hallmark. 

Verdict: A long commercial for AA -- a cocktail might help. **.