Fort Algiers

There's murky and nasty goings-on in French Africa, stirred up by tuxedo-and-turban-wearing Raymond Burr. Yvonne De Carlo is blackmailed into going undercover there, and she soon has Burr greatly interested. What -- or rather, whom -- Miss De Carlo is being blackmailed over is former Signal Corps officer Carlos Thompson, who nearly killed a superior officer, presumably over Miss De Carlo. Now he is a private in the French Foreign Legion.

Miss De Carlo is top-billed, and she gets more screen time than anyone else. She also sings a song as part of her cover. It's the sort of engaging nonsense that still filled the movie screens at this point. Supposedly this UA release was filmed in Morocco. If so, they took pains to find geographical features that are exact duplicates to those around Lone Pine, Mount Whitney, and other sites in California that any fan of cheap B westerns would recognize, as well as a derelict wooden structure that looks like something out of those same oaters. Still, it's fun to find such typical Bedouins and Rif riff-raff as John Dehner, Leif Erickson, and Robert Warwick.

A female secret agent is sent to French North Africa posing as a night club singer to investigate the massacre of a French Foreign Legion outpost. She discovers a treacherous leader planning an attack on strategic oil fields.

Yvonne DeCarlo as a Mata Hari spy amidst the exotic locales is pure eye candy and Raymond Burr makes a great villain, charming yet slimy with grand schemes, they both make this film watchable- however the lead actor -Carlos Thompson is quite stiff and his character lacks colour. There's some good action (albeit stock footage), nice desert locales and set pieces, but it doesn't rise above routine. It's just a passable affair, which is efficiently made. It needed much more spice, less stodginess, the lack of Technicolor doesn't help. Lesley Selander does his best to keep things going despite the setbacks. He usually directs westerns and really good ones like Panhandle.

The usual desert hokum, with a noisy woodwind score by Michel Michelet (that bursts into piano at the end) but a budget that didn't run to colour; but fortunately embellished by elegantly stylised sets (probably left over from previous productions) lit to heighten their impact by master cameraman John Seitz (plus cool second unit work).

Top-billed Yvonne de Carlo as a glamorous spy photographs well in black & white (as 'The Munsters' later demonstrated), has a fabulous wardrobe and can ride a horse, while a good supporting cast - including Raymond Burr as a villainous Emir - keep straight faces.

I watched this courtesy of the Movies4Men channel, which offers a very wide range of quality. This was middling. Set in the early 1950s, it seemed to have an early-20th-century atmosphere to it, with massed Arab attacks on Legionnaire forts and columns of soldiers marching to the rescue with no motorised or air support. There were a few mid-century cars in the stock footage of Paris and an Arab town, and Yvette does use an eavesdropping device, but that's all.

The actors do well enough, though I didn't recognise Leif Ericson as the crop-haired sergeant - he certainly chewed the scenery. And it's always good to see the dependable John Dehner (and Yvonne de Carlo).

I was a bit puzzled by the Amir calling on his troops not to mention, on pain of death, the massacre at the beginning of the film, as it would have soon become common knowledge.

The mid-film relaying of the message did go on a bit and, as has been mentioned, there was something wrong with the distance and time when the Arabs arrived at the oil well.

All in all, pleasant, predictable viewing.

This adventure movie proves that Lesley Selander was not only a western film maker. Ok, this movie is told, written and acted as a western; just replace Arabs by Indians and Foreign Legion by the US Cavalry. Remember Selander's DESERT SANDS, another French Foreign Legion film. The exotic part is present, despite a black and white photography, such a shame, especially with a superb Yvonne De Carlo in a Mata Hari like character. Raymond Burr is outstanding as the evil guy; how could it be else? This movie belongs to the French Foreign legion ones and that makes me think one more time of my grief concerning DESERT HELL, from director Charles Marquis Warren. A so rare film that no one seems to have ever seen it. The review on Imdb looks very like the copycat of a dictionnary comment.