Last night we saw another brutal, uncompromising war film from Hammer Studios, once again directed by Val Guest. Luridly titled "The Camp on Blood Island"(1958), it's an unrelentingly grim scenario of life in a Japanese prisoner of war camp on an island off Malaya. Andre Morell stars as "Colonel Lambert", leader of the British prisoners. As the movie opens, one of the men - skinny and weak - is being forced to dig his own grave by a shouting, insistent Japanese adjutant named "Captain Sakamura" (Marne Maitland). His high pitched voice and rapid delivery cut both the audience and the prisoners to the core. He's the dictionary definition of a sadist, but he's not the worst officer in the camp. That dishonor would be reserved for his superior "Colonel Yamamitsu" (Ronald Radd), the camp commandant and a war criminal who's aware he will be hunted down if Japan is forced to surrender. If that happens, he's informed Col. Lambert that he will raze the camp and execute every man, woman and child therein (both a men's and a women's enclosure exists on the premises).
Soon after the movie opens, Col. Yamamitsu discovers that someone has broken into the communications hut. The radio has been disabled. In retaliation, he selects six prisoners at random for savage punishment. During their interrogations, Col. Lambert asks another man to attempt an escape. On a nearby island is a small Malay village where the natives have a radio. "I need you to swim there and broadcast a message".
Colonel Lambert has been keeping a secret from his men, and especially from Colonel Yamamitsu. Two atomic bombs have been dropped on Japan and the war in the Pacific is over. This is why he ordered the dismantling of the Japanese radio. If Yamamitsu finds out Japan has lost, he's going to execute all the prisoners. It's also why Lambert's been keeping the secret from his men, so that none of them can reveal it under torture. Lambert himself found out the news via a secret transmitter kept in a hole in the ground. The message he wants the escapee to transmit is a call for allied air support.
Meanwhile, spare parts have arrived for Yamamitsu's radio. Lambert cannot allow it to be repaired, so he sends the same man back to disable it once again. This is some very risky business as the comm hut is now guarded around the clock. Some of Lambert's men are now openly questioning his motives. One, an older officer who argues he's Lambert's superior, orders him to cooperate with Yamamitsu. "If we keep antagonizing him he'll eventually kill us all. You say you know what you're doing, but I've got a wife and child in the other camp. I demand you let me talk to the Colonel". "I can't allow that, and you are not in charge here. I am, by virtue of being named by Yamamitsu himself. You're just going to have to trust me".
The entire plot boils down to preventing Col. Yamamitsu from finding out the news before allied help can arrive. At one point a Navy flier crash lands on the island. He too is tortured, but Lambert manages to reach him first so he can tell him not to reveal the news. A revolt is eventually planned in case no help is forthcoming. Col. Lambert digs up an old cache of grenades. "These have been buried for three years and are pretty well corroded", he says, handing them out to the men. "Throw them quickly once you pull the pin". He also instructs them to make weapons "out of anything you can find". The men meet in secret the next night to show him the shivs, garrotes and bludgeons they've created from available materials. A takeover of the camp is planned for the following morning. "Failing that", Lambert tells the men, "kill as many of them as you can".
This movie is not for the squeamish. Like Val Guest's other war effort for Hammer, "Yesterday's Enemy", it's a straightforward and very ugly depiction of man's inhumanity to man. The Japanese officers are portrayed without the slightest shred of humanity, which may well have been true in these camps. The torture and interrogation scenes are not easy to sit through (and again are ahead of their time, cinematically speaking, in their starkness), but eventually the plot gains traction and the viewer is somewhat relieved to have an action-oriented escape theme to follow.
If you are a fan of World War Two movies and you can handle one that presents the darkest aspects of war, then I highly recommend "The Camp on Blood Island". In the dramatic sense it's a powerful film, and it's interesting that Hammer Studios produced two of the most realistic war films in the WW2 canon, and did so decades before, as I said in the earlier blog, such raw barbarity was shown in Vietnam movies like "Apocalypse Now" and "Platoon". I give it Two Huge Thumbs Up, but warn you that it's not an easy watch. The picture is widescreen and close to razor sharp. Give it a look if interested. ////
Our previous night's movie was "The Thief"(1952), starring Ray Milland as a nuclear physicist who's stealing Top Secret information from the Atomic Energy Commision where he works in Washington D.C. He photographs documents with a miniature camera. The film is then transferred through a maze of couriers to New York and then out of the country, to an unnamed Communist power. Milland uses stealth to avoid scrutiny, but spends restless nights at home in his apartment, where he seems to regret his participation. We don't know how or why he got involved. Was he blackmailed? Is he a commie himself? This we aren't told, however he's very good at his gambit. He makes several film drops without a hitch. Then one day, a New York courier is hit by a car and killed. The microfilm is discovered in his pocket. This brings on an FBI investigation. As it's clear where the documents came from - the AEC heading is on each one - the Bureau sends agents to interview every scientist in the building. Eventually Milland's turn comes up. We don't see him in the process of being interviewed, but he must've done something to attract further interest because the FBI puts a tail on him. He's good at evading that also. One night he ditches the agent following him, climbs up the fire escape on the side of his apartment and scampers over the rooftops like a chimneysweep. Not bad for a 45 year old office dwelling researcher.
The walls are closing in on him, however. He's gonna need an "out" before too long. It looks like he's been promised one when a telegram is pushed under his door, instructing him to pick up a fake passport in a train station storage locker. It comes with a seaman's identification papers. If he wants out, he going to have to sail to Cairo and make his own way from there. But to where? His life in the U.S. is over, one way or another and that's all I'm going to tell you about the plot.
I was tempted to do something I've never done before, which was to let you see this movie first before I reviewed it. The reason I was gonna do this is because it's has a quality that makes it unique, at least as far as I'm aware. I've never seen a movie like it, and I wondered if I could review it without revealing why it's unique. Now, if you're gonna watch it (and you should because it's a near masterpiece in my opinion), please please don't Google it in advance to see why I'm saying this. You'll get the gist as you watch, so please don't spoil it for yourself. And even then, you'll wonder a particular thing about this uniqueness. I don't wanna reveal that either. Just watch it and I'll mention it again in the next blog. It's equal parts spy film and noir, with excellent black and white photography and great location shooting in New York and Washington D.C. Particularly cool is the interior of a grand old library that's not unlike our own Central Library in downtown Los Angeles. That's where many of Milland's transactions take place. His performance here is also above and beyond, especially given the "uniqueness" of the picture. Milland more or less carries it, though there are several effective support players. One, whose name we don't know (the credits call him "Mr. Bleek", played by Martin Gabel) is quite creepy as the spy who gives Milland his instructions, dropping them in a cigarette pack on the sidewalk.
One final thing I want to mention about "The Thief". When you watch it, consider "Eraserhead". There's a scene, midway through, in which a leggy woman, wearing a wraparound dress, opens her door and comes into the hallway of Milland's building, just as he's entering his apartment. She has dark, curly hair - lots of it - and she gives him the same come hither stare down that a similar looking girl gave "Henry" in Lynch's movie. The woman makes Milland nervous, just as Henry was in his encounter. There's a payphone in the hallway, which I'm not sure but I believe was there in "Eraserhead". The woman makes another sultry appearance to again tantalize Ray Milland, standing in her doorway staring. I immediately thought, "this is too similar not to have influenced David Lynch". I'll bet you a nickel he's seen it. There is another scene in a darkened room, where a light flickers against a wall of shadows. In that scene I again thought of "Eraserhead", where the Man with the Pockmarked Face pulls the levers that control Henry's world.
Watch "The Thief" and see if you don't agree, especially in the scenes with the woman. I give it Two Huge Thumbs Up, giving us another Double Huge duo. We've sure found some good ones of late. I trust you're gearing up for Thanksgiving. Our next blog won't be until then, so I might as well mention how strange it will be for me not to share the holiday with Pearl. If you've followed the blog through the years, you might be aware that Thanksgiving was a shared tradition between our families since long before I became her caregiver. The tradition began sometime in the 1980s, when my Mom, Dad and sister would gather at Pearl's cabin on Pine Mountain in Frazier Park. Pearl's daughter Helen would be there, too. It was she who always did all the cooking. I was "doing my own thing" in those days (remember when I used to make Paul Prudhomme Cajun roasts for Thanksgivings at 9032 Rathburn?), so I never went to the cabin, but in 2004 I attended my first Thanksgiving in our two-family tradition, at Pearl's house in Reseda. I missed 2005 cause my Mom was sick, but since 2006 I've spent every Thanksgiving at Pearl's. That's 15 years in a row, the last eleven as her caregiver.
Man do I ever miss that nice lady. Make that two nice ladies, Helen most obviously included. I'll be sad but I'll also feel like both are still with me. Helen is back home in Northern California and I'm sure I'll see her again at some point. Pearl in a sense is much closer. I keep her in my heart and mind, and I'm working on my book. I feel as if she's writing it with me. We had one heck of a run, and the story of our time together, 11 1/2 years, is gonna make for one heck of a tale. It's interesting to consider that Pearl, as my neighbor, close family friend and Godmother, was "with me" in those ways when I came into the world, and I, as her caregiver, was with her and holding her hand, when she left it. That's really something amazing, I think.
That's all I know for tonight. I wish you a wonderful Thanksgiving and I send you Tons of Love as always.
xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo :):)
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