The Naked And The Dead (1958) We'll not waste a second laboring through descriptions of how much Hollywood had to homogenize, weaken and water down all the raw, profane fury of Norman Mailer's best selling novel of World War 2.
Unlike movie studios, novelists didn't have to adhere to the infamous nabobs of the Production Code, who carefully monitored levels of sex, violence and bad language in movies.
Therefore any film adaptation of any racy, steamy, dramatically daring or violent best seller was bound for castration and disembowelment before it ever went before a camera.
"The Naked and the Dead", which follows the exploits of a beleaguered army unit in the brutal Pacific campaign, was no exception. But in fairness to its veteran director Raoul Walsh, it featured combat sequences as bloody and graphic as any late 1950's studio film could get away with.
All the Hollywood World War 2 tropes stay in place here, such as tipping you off ahead of time as to which of the likable recruits aren't going to make it to the end of the film......
What still resonates after all these years: the primary theme the film hammers away at - the chasm between the people who've been dehumanized by war and the people who struggle to hold on to their decency and morality as the very barbaric nature of war serves to strip those human qualities away from them.......
The story also dabbles in the disconnect between the commanding officers who only see their troops in the abstract (as cannon fodder) and those officers who see them as flesh and blood individuals who end up with their flesh shredded and their blood spilled, based on command decisions.
But on the front lines, the primary clash here comes between the ferocious Sgt. Croft (Aldo Ray) and his platoon leader, the all too civilized and reasonable Lt. Hearn (Cliff Robertson).
War (and an unfaithful bimbo wife) has turned Croft into a rampaging monster.......he executes prisoners, collects their gold teeth and isn't above betraying Hearn while on a dangerous mission to scout out Japanese encampments. (You can think of him as a more Hollywood sanitized version of Tom Berenger's scarred-on-the-inside-and-out Sgt. Barnes from Oliver Stone's "Platoon".....)
Cliff Robertson's hapless Hearn is forced to fight three enemies.......the Japanese, the vicious Croft and his own superior, the cold, unfeeling General Cummings (Raymond Massey) who prefers to instill fear and loathing in his own troops.
All of these weighty issues play out amid all the cornball stereotypes that we've come to expect in vintage war movies......but that doesn't make the film any less fascinating to watch.
There's stellar work here from a load of young talents who found their ultimate niche as well known, busy character actors (L.Q. Jones, James Best, William Campbell, Richard Jaeckel, and even the deadpan comedian Joey Bishop)
It's hard to hold any sympathy for Aldo Ray's character, even when he's cuckolded by....who else but Barbara Nichols, adding to her extensive gallery of floozies.......
And let's not finish this post without mentioning the movie kicks off with one hell of a whambam militaristic main title theme by master maestro Bernard Herrmann.....very similar to the pounding ominous overwhelming brass sounds he'll use later in 1963's "Jason And The Argonauts".
Though Hollywood-ized for your protection (so we can well understand why Mailer despised it) "The Naked And The Dead" still remains something to see if you savor those huge studio attempts to chew ever so softly on heavy issues......2 & 1/2 stars (** 1/2)
No comments:
Post a Comment