Spada nel deserto

This is another movie I haven't seen in years, although it was last broadcast on AMC. (Despite the setting, it was filmed on the California coast.) Unfortunately, they have not said when, or if, they plan to re-air it.

The story line is quite true-to-life, insofar as historical fiction can be. The number of non-Jewish volunteers helping the Haganah during the Jewish struggle against the British mandate was quite amazing, and they did so for a variety of reasons, from a sense of justice, to Zionist motives, to a desire to get a 'lick in' at England.

British imperial duplicity was so accurately depicted here, that, when the movie was released, the British government protested that it slandered Her Majesty's government. Methinks they didst protest too much.

In reality, there were Brits in the Mandatory Administration who favored the Jewish struggle for an independent homeland, as there were those who favored the Arabs, but most saw it as a foreign posting in their careers, a job to be done fairly, but always with an eye to Britain's interests, even as they protested that they were acting on behalf of the 'natives'.

A complex time, reduced to a movie whose verisimilitude is striking. The Haganah exploits depicted, such as the blowing up of all bridges (not that there were that many) at the borders of Mandatory Palestine, and the announcement of the High Commissioner's replacement (before he learned of it) did happen.

This is the earliest movie about the Ha'apalah, the illegal immigration into Mandatory Palestine before the independence of the State of Israel. Other movies set in the same time and place are Kirk Douglas' "The Juggler" and "Cast a Giant Shadow".

I can only hope it becomes available on video or CD, as I would like to see it again.

Sword in the Desert was a quickly made feature film trying to cash in on the headlines concerning the rebirth of the State of Israel. The hopes and dreams of millions of Jews around the world who for two generations sent in sometimes pittance contributions to the Jewish Committee who started BUYING land in Palestine from the Ottoman Empire in the hopes of carving out a homeland for displaced people finally was realized a year earlier.

The origins of Israel are always obscured by Arab propaganda about Zionist Imperialism. The nucleus of Israel is from land BOUGHT and then formalized by United Nations partition. When six Arab nations disagreed and attack Israel beat them back and acquired more than what she was originally intended for. That's also how they later got the whole of Jerusalem, when three nations attacked Israel again in 1967 in the Six Day War.

Dana Andrews plays a captain of a tramp freighter who's making a nice living smuggling Jewish refugees into Palestine. He's strictly a cash and carry operator, but one time he gets himself caught up with his cargo when the British find him with same. He gets rescued by the Hagannah along with the rest of the refugees. After living with the Hagannah and seeing what they're up against, he becomes a committed Zionist himself. Of course the Zionist cause was definitely helped by having the beautiful and shapely Marta Toren working on his conversion. To Zionism, not to Judaism.

The part of Kurta the charismatic Hagannah leader was the one that gave Jeff Chandler his first real notice. Chandler, who's real name was Ira Grossel was himself Jewish and one who felt his roots very deeply. Later on he made a well publicized trip to Israel in the late Fifties and expressed a wish to be buried there. When he died in 1961 his wishes were not carried out by his daughters and his ex-wife. Nevertheless, Chandler always treasured this film because of what it meant to him both professionally and personally.

Stephen McNally has a substantial role as Hagannah fighter David Vogel and Irish actor Liam Redmond plays a former IRA man who joins up with the Jews because the British are tilting their neutrality way over to the Arabs. A lot of former IRA men did join up with the nascent Israeli cause and died for the creation of the Jewish state. Ironic that later on another generation of the IRA sided with the Arabs.

Sword in the Desert was quickly put together and its hurried preparation does show. Still it's a good, but hardly a definitive story about Israeli independence. For that we would have to wait for Exodus and Cast a Giant Shadow.

This tidy little Universal "B" about the Israeli fight for independence would be interesting if just for the subject matter alone--there were few, if any, contemporary Hollywood pictures that dealt with that particular struggle--but this isn't a bad picture in and of itself. Dana Andrews plays a ship captain who smuggles Jews into Israel purely, at first, for the money, but finds himself being caught up in the cause his "cargo" is fighting for--and also falling for an Israeli girl (the exotic beauty Marta Toren, who, although she looks like she just stepped out of an Arabian Nights tale, is actually Swedish). Director George Sherman was an expert at turning out tight, energetic little actioners, and continues that tradition here. The Andrews/Toren romance slows things down a bit, but not enough to do any fatal damage. A neat little picture with an interesting perspective on a subject not often touched upon, with a capable cast, good pacing and quick bursts of action that all combine to hold your interest. Check it out.

Those interested in the pre-1948 history of Israel will find this movie interesting and entertaining.

It reminded me in some ways of an early version of Otto Preminger's Exodus.

I think that they could have done more with Dana Andrews' part, but still worth watching.

PREDATING THE PRODUCTION and release of EXODUS by about a dozen year or so, this film presents us with a fictional account of the movement toward a Jewish Homeland. Basing the story on real life incidents that occurred involving the smuggling of mostly European Jews into the Holy Land, doing so in spite of regulations to the contrary imposed by the British; who controlled Palestine ever since the end o World War I.

ADDITIONALLY, Resistance WAS given by he various Arab peoples who lived there. This is the first dramatization of conflicts and problems which exist right down to this very day, hour and minute.

THE CAST ASSEMBLED was again most capable, talent-laden and appropriately seasoned. Headed up by Dana Andrews (as a cynical, world- weary gentile ship captain), he is ably assisted and supported by: Marta Toren, Stephen McNally, Jeff Chandler, Phillip Friend Hugh French, Liam Redmond and even Hayden Roarke. Many others also participated.

IN HORT, CYNICAL ship's captain (Dana Andrews) has a deep change of hart and a veritable Epiphany concerning hi view of lie and the World itself. His cold, indifferent attitudes slowly get eroded as he observes the determination of those displaced, penniless people, braving it all; in an all or nothing drive to settle in and found the modern State of Israel.

THE ACTIONS PORTRAYED, as well as the characters depicted, were largely symbolic and intended to rally World-wide support for the home-lander movement. We vividly recall one particular exchange among those lines. When Capt. Dillon (Mr. Andrews)) discovers a rebel soldier to be from Ireland and asks him just why he is there. All decked out in his best uniform of the IRA, the Irishman answers; "Because this is where this fight is!"

A VERY MEMORABLE scene featuring Christmas Eve in Bethlehem closes out the movie's emotional appeal to America and the World, regardless of whatever one's religion may be.