Processo e morte di un soldato

Although James Coburn's character is called Major Donnenberg in the movie, the person who actually defended Leonski was Ira C. Rothgerber, Jr. He died in 1993 and was one of the greatest Colorado lawyers of the 20th Century.

With the outbreak of World War II, Ira joined the Army and rose to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel. Stationed in the South Pacific and Australia, he served in combat areas and won a Bronze Star. In Australia, he served with another young lawyer from New Jersey, Colonel Bill Powers, whom he convinced to return with him to Denver and join the firm at the end of the war. The firm then became known as Rothgerber, Appel & Powers.

During his service in Australia, Ira was appointed as co-counsel to represent a young, uneducated private accused of the rape and murder of several Sydney women. General MacArthur's command was determined to show the Australians that U.S. soldiers in their country would be held to a strict code of conduct, and the prosecution sought the death penalty. The soldier, William Leonski, was by all accounts mentally deranged and likely insane. Nevertheless, he was found competent to stand trial, and his mental impairment defense-then unprecedented in military courts-was swiftly rejected.

His client summarily tried, convicted, and sentenced to hang, Ira sought an appeal through the military high command. Denied review, Ira dictated by long-distance telephone a petition for stay and certiorari to Denver for transmission to the U.S. Supreme Court. However, before the Court could consider the petition, Leonski was hanged

It's obvious from the remarks in the previous commentaries by others, that none of them were ever in the military. Coburn was portraying a Military Police major (Maj. Dannenberg) serving as the Assistant Provost Marshal - he was not playing an Army attorney. At that time (and still optional today) an officer from any branch in the military can serve as legal council to an accused soldier - you don't have to be a lawyer (JAG Corps). This particular story was true, and is the event in military history that is directly responsible for the creation and implementation of the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) applicable to all the Armed Forces. The film is accurate and does not portray any Hollywood political bias. It's a great film and a good piece of history. A little known fact: Gen. MacArthur came close to being court martialed for preventing Maj. Dannenberg from appealing Pvt. Leonski's death sentence and conviction, but political allies in Washington intervened.

Despite a previous poster's wildly inaccurate and hysterical right-wing rantings (among other things, the fact that he kept calling it a "Hollywood" film when it was in fact made by an Australian company with an Australian director and was shot in Australia, and his claim that the "Hollywood" filmmakers wanted to let Reb Brown's character go free when no such thing was even remotely suggested leads one to suspect that this guy never actually saw the film and is just repeating what he read on some shrill far-right-wing website) this is a very good movie, and is based on an actual event. Eddie Leonski (played to near perfection by Reb Brown) was a brain-damaged (caused by a combination of years of heavy drinking and severe beatings by his parents when he was a child), acutely alcoholic American soldier with obviously severe mental problems who was stationed in Australia during WW II. He murdered several young women during a string of off-duty binges of heavy drinking. When he is finally caught (turned in by a fellow soldier to whom he had inadvertently admitted the murders), provost marshal James Coburn is assigned to his defense. Although not happy about it, once Coburn meets his client it's obvious to even his untrained eye that Leonski has serious mental defects and little if any grip on reality (at one point Coburn wonders how someone like Leonski with such glaringly obvious mental problems managed to even get into the army). When he tries to get Leonski placed in a hospital for the criminally insane, however, he discovers that the authorities--American and Australian--are determined to hang him, their decision based more on political considerations than Leonski's shockingly obvious mental deficiencies. The performances by the two leads and the mostly Australian cast are excellent, with Coburn standing out as usual. A subplot concerning his budding romance with a local girl is unnecessary and doesn't go anywhere anyway, but otherwise this is a crackerjack little picture, a fascinating and little known story told well with first-rate performances by Coburn and Brown. Well worth watching.

In the 1970s Phillipe Mora looked to be a director who was going to deliver the goods. His strange doco BROTHER CAN YOU SPARE A DIME was a 30s jigsaw puzzle of fascinating imagery that needed a commentary. In the 80s he delivered this quite fascinating film. But in the 90s it all went wrong with terrible horror films and now, nothing. In the last week I have seen two James Coburn films. I have never ever been interested in any performance or film of his. Timing has now led me to THE AMERICANIZATION OF EMILY (1964)...a superb military satire, and DEATH OF A SOLDIER, two films made 20 years apart both with him, both set during WW2... and I have to admit I now have a new found appreciation of Coburn's acting and characterizations. DEATH OF A SOLDIER is a very well made Wartime murder drama with a protagonist played by under rated and over looked he-man Reb Brown. My only vision of him was during BIG Wednesday of all things, when, during a hilarious house party, he cleaned up the gatecrashers in a demolition derby worthy of Hercules visiting Animal House. He is great looking and appears as a cross between Steve McQueen and Ryan O'Neal with a great physique. Here that look is used to great affect as a loudmouth Yankee party bumpkin on leave during WW2 whose alcoholic haze leads to crimes that actually did happen In Melbourne in the mid 40s.. His character is a lot like that of Don Murray, the yahooo-ing cowboy in the Marilyn Monroe film BUS STOP. It is the study of his mentality and it's effect that mires Coburn into a court trial or considerable predicament. The film is excellent and interesting in so many ways, and really flawed in two major things: the clumsy appearance of "General MacArthur" posing and strutting about.... never speaking ..even wearing sunglasses indoors to maintain the image (Jeez!) ....and the overuse of obvious 40s music. If I hear In The Mood again in a 40s film well..... Sadly the film did no biz in its day which I remember had a lot to do with Mora's difficulties with the distributor and with the media, and remains a strange and interesting example of a period piece pic almost 'got right'. Coburn is the best actor there, among Aussie stalwarts... with Maurie Fields being very real. There is far too much swearing.

"Death of a Soldier" is a first-rate little thriller, based on an actual incident that took place in Australia during WW II. Eddie Leonski, an American soldier stationed in Australia, goes partying in the local bars at night. Women are attracted to his boyish charm, rugged good looks and spectacular physique. What they don't know is that underneath that exterior is a brain-damaged serial killer. Years of heavy alcohol consumption, and horrible physical abuse at home, have driven Eddie to the point that when he gets drunk he turns into an uncontrollable killer. He first asks his victims to sing for him, and when they do, he strangles them ("I just want your voice, that's all . . ."). He is eventually turned in by one of his fellow soldiers who is aghast when he hears Eddie offhandedly remark, "I think I killed a couple of those women."

The movie doesn't end there, though. It shows how Eddie is used by all sides--the U.S. Army, the Australian government--to further their own agendas. The Army wants to hang him, the Australians don't want to offend the Army just at the time it needs help to fend off a possible Japanese invasion, and nobody particularly cares that Eddie is obviously insane and has no idea what he has done or what is going on around him. Reb Brown, best known as a star of low-grade action movies, is outstanding as the pathetic Eddie, never turning him into the caricature of the hulking, subhuman serial killer. He really makes you feel for Eddie. James Coburn is fine as always as the lawyer appointed to defend him, but it's Reb Brown's show, and he is up to it. It's a shame Brown never got a chance to do anything else as good as this, and it's also a shame that this film is as unknown as it is. It deserves a much wider audience than it's gotten.