With major hostilities coming to an end in 1953, Hollywood must have felt it time (or just commercially viable) to bring its big guns to the Korean War. Hence Paramount releasing a starry adaptation of a James Michener’s bestseller, THE BRIDGES AT TOKO-RI/’54.* A hot ticket item that likely explains this far more modest rush job (in theaters months before BRIDGES) with less starry M-G-M contract leads in an adaptation of a James Michener magazine article. They do however put Michener himself in the film (played by Louis Calhern) as a visiting journalist even though the film’s main story about a blinded pilot being talked down to try and land on an aircraft carrier isn’t by Michener but Commander Harry Burns. Elsewise, it’s one of those Portrait of a Ship films, heavily larded with actual war footage (some pretty hair-raising) in unmatched stock. Painfully out of shape Frank Lovejoy leads his unit (Van Johnson, Keenan Wynn*, Robert Horton, et al.) in frustrating multiple air runs to take out Korean supply routes. Legendary second-unit director Andrew Marton (see BEN-HUR/’59) handles first-unit efficiently (he even keeps comic relief to a minimum), but the real reason to listen in is for the full reel of music Miklós Rózsa wrote to accompany the ‘blind’ flight back to ship. There’s no vocal component, but it’s basically a cantata for aircraft and wounded pilot that outdoes anything else in here. It’d make a knockout symphonic piece on any program. And as to Korean War follow-ups? Never quite happened in a big way on what’s often called the Forgotten War.
ATTENTION MUST BE PAID: *Look quick for an early appearance of Jerry Mathers (later The ‘Beaver’) as Wynn’s 6-yr-old kid sending Christmas Greetings by film.
DOUBLE-BILL/LINK: *As mentioned, BRIDGES AT TOKO-RI, not without a pretentious philosophic angle, but awfully well-crafted in its last couple of reels. https://maksquibs.blogspot.com/2008/07/bridges-at-toko-ri-1954.html
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