Three years after singing thru sublimated sexual tensions between a British lady and a controlling authoritarian ruler in THE KING AND I, Deborah Kerr and Yul Brynner reunited to confront subliminal sexual tensions between a British Lady (capital ‘L’) and a controlling authoritarian USSR commander in Hungary. Once again, a steely lady’s civilizing influence and bottled-up passion bring mixed results. Even odder, this ripped-from-the-headlines tale about a motley group of travelers desperate to leave Communist Hungary amid an erupting partisan uprising, but stuck on the wrong side of the Austrian border, finds its character template in (of all the cast lists in all the world) CASABLANCA/’42! With Kerr, Brynner & debuting Jason Robards* making like Ingrid Bergman, Humphrey Bogart & Paul Henreid. Copycat support, too, with Robert Morley doing double-duty as Claude Rains and Sydney Greenstreet while Kurt Kasnar goes all S. Z. Sakall. (No CASABLANCA connection, but Anouk Aimée makes a heck of an impression as a resistance fighter.) Anatole Litvak, fresh from directing Brynner in ANASTASIA/’56, is far less assured in this more realistic environment, but comes thru with something less artificial as suspense & action tropes kick in for the third act. Implausible & disingenuous, but watchable if you stick with it.
DOUBLE-BILL: Elia Kazan got a bit closer to the mark, but still came up short, fleeing Communist Czechoslovakia in MAN ON A TIGHTROPE/’53.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Actually two major acting debuts in here: 37-yr-old Robards and five-yr-old Ronny Howard!
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