La corde de sable

I rate this movie pretty highly and then I wonder, were Hollywood movies in the late 40s generally this good, in which case I'll have to see a lot more. "Rope of Sand" is so well made--the story clicks along, every shot is perfectly placed and serves the story, both day and night scenes in a desert are grandly photographed. The interiors are more elaborate than one might imagine, but Edith Head's costumes for Ms. Calvet guarantee that her character is irresistibly sexy. The cast has been gathered from across Europe and beyond--OK, some of them more difficult to follow than others--the supremely skilled actor, Claude Rains, Peter Lorre doing his elegant lowlife, Marais and Miranda singing in a nightclub. And of course young Burt Lancaster, both beautiful and doing the turns of his character. Credit then too to Paul Henreid, holding his own in a fight scene with Lancaster. And there's even a willingness to define South Africa by its racism, from the opening scene of a Black man being chased by converging trucks in the desert. I won't underline an inference about political economy.

Rope Of Sand is one of those films that as Burt Lancaster said he did for the poke. It's a routine action/adventure film that some have said is a Casablanca reunion. Also it was Corinne Calvet's first American feature.

But besides Lancaster and Calvet the cast includes Claude Rains, Peter Lorre, and Paul Henreid. Rains is playing his role as a diamond magnate as if Captain Renaud had retired from the army and went to South Africa to make his fortune in diamonds. Rains is the elegant sophisticated head of a diamond cartel and for amusement he likes to manipulate people. Lorre plays a kinder, gentler version of Ugarte I doubt he would murder two German couriers for letters of transit, but he might pick their pockets.

But Paul Henreid is as about as far away from the courageous anti-Nazi freedom fighter Victor Laszlo as you can get. He's the brutal commandant of the diamond police. Yes the Union of South Africa did have such an outfit with police powers to protect one of the country's most valuable resources for the nation and most assuredly for the mine owners. You'll see this also in Sands Of The Kalahari and Gold, both films set in apartheid South Africa as this was.

Lancaster plays a guide who finds a cache of diamonds and gets a beating at the hands of Henreid and his storm troopers. Rains would like to get his hands on the diamonds also and cut Henreid out as he personally can't stand him, but he's useful on occasion. After Calvet who plays a prostitute tries the old badger game on him unsuccessfully Rains hires her to work on Lancaster to divulge his secret. She also goes to work on Henreid as well.

But as what usually happens Burt's charming ways get to her all leading to an inevitable climax about her and the diamonds.

The title Rope Of Sand refers to the desert surrounding where the diamond mines are. It's a decent enough action adventure film made more enjoyable by a great cast of the best supporting players around.

The cast makes this one worth watching: Burt Lancaster, Paul Henreid, Claude Rains (at his silkiest), Peter Lorre, Sam Jaffe. The character Corinne Calvet plays is a screenwriter's dream since she's likely to spark unexpected changes in each of the male characters, but as an earlier contributor pointed out, Calvet isn't up to the part. It's hard to believe that a man such as Burt Lancaster's character could become so smitten with her.

The South Africa setting adds interest to the proceedings and the plot uncoils in skillful fashion until the last reel or so when the rush toward climax becomes somewhat delayed and diffused.

Burt Lancaster's whipping at the hands of Paul Henreid no longer includes details mentioned in the book "Sadism in the Cinema," which implies that some footage has been cut from prints. Even in abbreviated form, however, the scene conveys the hint that the real emotional bond in the movie is not between Lancaster and Calvet but between Lancaster and Henreid. Henreid's brutally sublimated desire for Lancaster is certainly understandable since Burt never looked better than he does here.

Director William Dieterle did better movies than ROPE OF SAND but he never did one in more unusual settings than in South West Africa, now Namibia. Paul Henreid and Peter Lorre had featured in CASABLANCA seven years earlier, Rains had pulled off one of his best performances in Hitchcock's NOTORIOUS three years earlier, and Lancaster was beginning to make a name for himself. A really good cast for a film that did not seem set for great box office returns.

Interesting to note that apartheid was about to appear in that part of the world, yet it is human greed that dominates the film, with diamonds the commodity most sought.

Acting is generally good, although the French accent hinders Calvet's delivery, even renders it awkward at times. The fighting sequences fall somewhat short of credible. The screenplay is also uneven. Photography is very good.

As a little known film, it deserves watching. And it posts enough quality to not rate a waste of time. 8/10.

This is a film of considerable charm and interest, a postwar noir updating of the Warner Bros. "Casablanca"-style foreign intrigue routine that substitutes a refreshing toughness for the earlier films' cotton-candy romanticism. As usual, the stalwart leading man plays second fiddle to the character roles. Claude Rains takes his wry-and-witty routine to the level of sublime high camp, Peter Lorre purrs lyrical philosophy in a rumpled linen suit and three-day beard, and Paul Henried does much better as the arrogant, sadistic villain (reminiscent of Ronald Merrick in "Jewel in the Crown") than he ever did as a leading man. There's even subtle criticism of the apartheid system thrown in. What could have been a minor classic and certainly the best of the "Casablanca" clones is severely compromised however by the presence of Corinne Calvet, whose ferret face and rusty-hinge voice make a potentially pleasurable film difficult to watch, let alone enjoy.