Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 162: More War Stories

It seems that as I wrap up the 1950s I have left all the war films till the last minute which I'm not sure was a subconscious decision or not. The lasest one is Battleground which apparently is the first significant film to be made about World War 2 after the conflict had finished. Just like the previous film in this list, Decision Before Dawn, this is based on a group of soldiers in the latter stages of 1944. We find Jim Layton being bought in as a replacement soldier into a squad in the 101st Airborne Division who at first completely ignore him as they have no time for the new man in their unit. They are sent into the Ardennes to prepare for a surprise attack by the Germans just as Holley, star of the show Van Johnson, returns to the group and is soon given leadership after the original captain is injured. The film tries to portray a pretty realistic version of events as men are routinely injured and some don't survive their deaths being pretty quick including one young soldier who is killed when a house starts to collapse. Even big names such as Ricardo Montalaban, here playing Latin American Roderigues, don't survive in his case he freezes to death after his squad forget about him. Layton is eventually accepted as part of the team and is paired with the popular Holley and just as the squad prepare to give up hope they are replaced and able to go back but even after all their turmoil they still march in line and sing along with their commander as they leave.

For me the best thing about Battleground is the interaction between the actors so much so that I felt that this was one of the most believable war films I'd ever seen. The first thirty minutes or so establishes the relationships between soldiers during the war including the cold shoulder treatment that a lot of rookies are subjected to and the banter that flies around them. It is also interesting that none of these men are presented as heroes and at one point or another most of them think about fleeing rather than carrying out their duties of stopping the German attack. There were some great turns here including from Van Johnson as the sarcastic Holley and Marshall Thompson as the impressionable Layton however there were so many characters here that I couldn't keep up with some of them and I felt that a couple could've been cut or at least given smaller roles so I knew who to concentrate on. Like with Decision Before Dawn everything looks quite realistic from the costume design to the way that the soldiers walk around their snowy surroundings as they discover if there is someone lurking around the corner wanting to kill them. I think that all involved with the script and the making of the film did their research as I really enjoyed Battleground it painted a picture of the Batcamaraderie or war and also the loneliness and how fleeting life can be. Apart from the overabundance of characters there's not much to complain about in a very accomplished film that has been forgotten as the years have gone by.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 142: One Final Bogey

As I've gone through the decades so far I've seen a lot of film stars of the classic era - Grant, Gable, Davis, Katharine Hepburn, Fred and Ginger and of course Humphrey Bogart. As far as this Oscar Challenge goes we first saw Bogey back in the 1930s as a gangster in Dead End. From there we've seen him as private detective, treasure hunter and most notably the tortured Rick in Casablanca. However we don't get to see his only Oscar win for The African Queen as that didn't receive a Best Picture nomination instead Bogart's journey ends at the 1955 ceremony with his final Oscar nomination as Commander Queeg in The Caine Mutiny. The film revolves around the Caine a minesweeper-destroyer which is seen as a bit of a battered ship and not the first option for most sailors on board. Joining the crew is Ensign Willie Keith who soon strikes up a bond with would-be novelist Tom Keefer as well as ingratiating himself with the other crew members including Captain DeVriess and Lt. Maryk.DeVriess is soon replaced by Queeg who is a very regimental sort and is compared to Mutiny on the Bounty's Captain Bligh by Keefer. Keefer suggests to Maryk and Keith that Queeg is a little bit insane although Maryk refuses to report this until he has more proof so starts keeping a journal of Queeg's poor decisions. This eventual leads to Maryk taking over from Queeg on one mission a decision that is seconded by Keith and after this they are both arrested for mutiny. Lawyer Lt. Barney Greenwald reluctantly takes the case without ever agreeing with the decision made by the men but wins the case after proving Queeg is a man with paranoia however during the case Keefer doesn't stick up for his former colleagues denying the fact that he thought Queeg was insane. In the end Greenwald confronts Keefer saying that he planted  mutinous thoughts in the heads of the other officers and Keith heads off for service on a new boat once again captained by DeVriess.

I very much enjoyed The Caine Mutiny mainly because your perceptions of the characters are changed at every turn. Like Maryk and Keith I went along with Keefer's thoughts about Queeg being insane but forgot about him opening up to his officers after a poor decision. Barney's confrontation of the three men at the end of the film is one of its best scenes and he reminds them that Queeg is a military man through and through and deserves respect he ends the film not as a Bligh-esque monster but more a tragic figure driven mad through years of service. Queeg's humane side is a testament to the character that Humphrey Bogart gives to him and I think he could've easily have on a second Best Actor Oscar had he not been challenged by Marlon Brando's terrific turn in On the Waterfront. Indeed the film suffered from being up against On The Waterfront particularly when it came to the Supporting Actors in the film as Waterfront took three spots in the supporting category and Caine's only entry into that category was surprisingly Tom Tully as DeVriess who exits the film very early and didn't leave an impression on me. If I had had to put someone forward it would probably have been Van Johnson as Maryk a man who always wanted to do the right thing but took the wrong course of action after being manipulated by Keefer. Jose Ferrer as Barney was also great as the man who wanted to win a case he didn't particularly believe in and even Fred McMurray's Keefer is a good complex character. But it was Robert Francis' performance as Willie Keith which anchors the film, pardon the pun, in only his second film tragically this would be his last as Francis was being groomed for stardom but perished in an aircraft accident. The Caine Mutiny also has a great love for its naval roots being backed by the U.S. Navy the scenes aboard the ship and in its many cabins are shot perfectly and some of the minor cast, including bizarrely Lee Marvin, were cast due to their naval background.

All in all a great film which in any other year would've won Best Picture but as I said before it had the unlucky fortune of coming up against the juggernaut that was On the Waterfront. And a small battered ship like The Caine never had a chance against a Juggernaut like that.

Matt's Big Oscar Challenge Day 104: Not Many Laughs

Today if you watched a film with the word comedy in it you would expect a laugh out loud romp, not so in 1944 and that year's Best Story Winner - The Human Comedy. The film deals with the adventures of the Macaulay family during World War II primarily focusing on the middle son Homer played by Mickey Rooney. I wasn't so sure about this film because of Rooney's previous performances in the two Spencer Tracey movies I'd seen him in, Captains Courageous and Boys Town, in which he'd either failed to make an impression or he'd gone over the top. However in The Human Comedy, in which he was nominated for Lead Actor, his wide-eyed innocence and over the top spirit were used well in the character of Homer. Despite the war raging and his brother fighting in battle he keeps a bright expression as he helps out his mother and goes to work at the telegram station. His relationship with the two other men he works with, Frank Morgan's Willie Grogan and James Craig's Tom Spangler, form some of the film's better scenes forming almost a surrogate family as the two men take the place of the father Homer has lost and the brother who is away. We also see the older brother, Marcus, at war conversing with a friend Tobey and reminiscing about how much he misses his hometown of Ithaca. While the youngest brother Ulysses is always seemingly getting into mischief but then he only seems to be about four. The whole thing is narrated by the deceased father of the Macaulay clan as he looks over to see that his family are alright.

Obviously shot and shown during the war this film would've been seen by people who were missing their loved ones while they were away fighting and it obviously gave them hope. There are some nice little scenes here including Spangler finding love and Rooney gaining the approval of his stern school mistress. However there are also some missteps for one part there is far too much singing and there is also a segment that lasts about ten minutes in which Ulysses and other boys from the town go to steal some apricots from an apricot tree, I'm sure this is what happened regularly in that neighbourhood but we still really don't need to see a blow by blow account of fruit theft. The end of the film is quite sad, but I suppose that's the point, things never go exactly as we plan them and if this set out to portray an accurate account of what life was like for families in the early 1940s in small town America then I think it did a good job and Rooney's performance in the last couple of scenes were deserving of his nomination, the film itself lost out to the far superior Casablanca but I think it was more than deserving of a place in that year's top 10 list.