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Tuesday, September 12, 2023

VERBOTEN! (1959)

Leave it to crackpot iconoclast writer/director Samuel Fuller, the man with the tabloid touch, to go da capo on the famous WWII ‘V For Victory’ opening tattoo from Beethoven’s Fifth (it’s Morse Code for ‘V’) using rifles to repeat the percussive rhythm as they advance into a German town.  And that’s just the opening of this offensively crude tale of a German woman of dicey allegiance who helps a wounded U.S. liberator, hiding him from Nazis before quickly marrying him for those post-war perks.  And wouldn’t you just know, she ends up honestly falling for the naïf only to lose him when he gets wised up to her initial game plan.  Heck, hadn’t he quit the army just so he could stay around for German reconstruction . . . and her!  Targeted as an Ugly American by local Commie Provocateurs, dissed by his wife’s Nazi-loyalist kid brother, used as cover by a seemingly sympathetic German who’s really an undercover  Neo-fascist plotter.  Not to worry, the kid will change his tune after seeing newsreel coverage of the Nuremberg Trials, the wife will untangle her feelings, and the false German friend will ignite a fire that permanently separates the good guys from the bad.  Shot on a dime, and looking it, Fuller has particular trouble integrating real war footage, while the Nuremberg highlights reel is distressingly used as cheap emotional fodder.  The film still worth a look to see a standout perf from Tom Pittman as the false German friend.  With his striking looks and talent, he’d have been heard of if not for a deadly car wreck some months before this film was even released.  Ironically, a big James Dean fan, Pittman had been driving the same make & model car that Dean crashed just a couple of years back.

WATCH THIS/NOT THAT/LINK:  After a high water mark under contract at 20th/Fox, Fuller’s career grew wildly uneven, split between indie features and tv series.  This one bookended by better, if typically uneven, post-FOX work: FORTY GUNS/’57 and THE CRIMSON KIMONO/’59.  https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2008/05/forty-guns-1957.html  https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2016/04/the-crimson-kimono-1969.html

ATTENTION MUST BE PAID/LINK: Paid to an astoundingly awful love theme sung over the credits by Paul Anka.  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W_SUZeBNLQs

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