Sahara
                                                                                                                             
Director: Zoltan Korda
Year: 1943
Rating: 7.0
I am not a fan of war movies for the most part unless they are big epic ones like The Longest Day or Apocalypse Now. It is the smaller intimate ones that kill me. They are too much like And Then There Were None horror films. The film introduces you to all the players, you get to know them, if they have family at home, where they are from, their plans after the war and then proceed to kill them off one by one. If done right, it hurts. But I make exceptions for Bogart. He had finally made it big in 1941 with The Maltese Falcon - just in time for the war. Bogart had enlisted in the Navy in WWI and tried this time around but was rejected for being too old. But not too old for a series of WW II propaganda films. All Through the Night, Across the Pacific, Casablanca, Action in the North Atlantic, Passage to Marseille, To Have and Have Not and this one were all propaganda films. The Big Shot in 1942 was about the only non-propaganda film that he was in.



In terms of propaganda, this one does a great job. It is directed by Zoltan Korda who along with his brother Alexander had directed or produced a number of classic films. This was shot over four months in the desert in California where temperatures were very hot. Bogart would start every day with two martinis that his wife Mayo Methot would bring to the set, then argue with Korda for 30 minutes before filming. At night back at the hotel, Bogart would invite everyone up for drinks. Bogart was a famous drinker, but by the shoot, he was ready to go. He gives a classic tough guy Bogart performance here.



He is a tank commander with two men - Dan Duryea and Bruce Bennett. Bennett had set records in the shot put, won a silver medal at the 1928 Olympics and had been Tarzan in one film. He had actually been selected by MGM to play Tarzan, but he broke his shoulder and was replaced by some guy named Weissmuller. They are the only tank left after a battle pre film and are ordered to retreat. Along the way they pick up a group of Brit survivors, a Free Frenchman, a Sudanese soldier (Rex Ingram), an Italian prisoner (J. Carrol Naish) and later a German pilot (Kurt Kreuger) who had attacked them. They have their first casualty (Lloyd Bridges). They are very low on water and head to a water hole. There is enough for them to fill their canteens. About to continue their journey, they learn that a German battalion is heading their way and with no water. And this is when the propaganda really kicks in. Bogart wants them to stay and fight and gives one of those great speeches about sacrifice and valor. They stay.