Les insurgés

This has to be the most radical, left wing film ever made in Hollywood. It is amazing that Huston and some of the other principals were not blacklisted afterwords; the McCarthy era was well underway in 1949 when the film was released. (Garfield was blacklisted, but not as a result of this particular film.)

This is a taut, suspenseful, exciting movie. But what stands out for me is that the central theme and focus of the story is the "need" to dedicate one's life to the overthrow of a dictatorship by whatever means necessary. I've never seen an American film so uncompromisingly pro-revolutionary. The heros of the film are guerrilla warriors planning a bombing that will kill dozens or hundreds of innocents along with lots of deserving government officials.

One significant drawback to this film is it's very extensive use of process photography, shooting the principal actors against background film shot on location. Whole scenes are shot this way and it's distracting.

Can anyone tell me where I can find a copy of this? I haven't seen it in thirty years, and if it is half as good as I remember, this is a must-see! What's up with Columbia holding back their classics? The Reckless Moment, made the same year (1949) by Columbia is also unavailable. These are major films directed by, respectively, John Huston and Max Ophuls, starring the likes of Jennifer Jones, John Garfield, Gilbert Roland, Joan Bennett, and James Mason. The Reckless Moment was recently remade decently as The Deep End, but it still doesn't compare. If anyone knows where I can get We Were Strangers, please post it here. Thanks, movie lovers!

The part of a fiery revolutionary in 1933 Cuba seems tailor made for John Garfield. Both his politics and screen persona mesh nicely in the role of Nick Fenner for him in We Were Strangers. As for his lack of Hispanic accent, we are told that he is of mixed Cuban and American parentage. I'm glad Garfield didn't try an accent, he looked downright silly doing one as Porfirio Diaz in Juarez.

John Huston directed We Were Strangers and even second drawer Huston is better than first drawer of most directors. The film is about a really far out plot for a Coup d'etat against President Gerardo Machado of Cuba in 1933. Garfield has sold them one a plan to assassinate the president and his entire cabinet by means of a bomb at a funeral internment. As it happens Jennifer Jones's house is located across from Havana's main cemetery. The idea is to first kill a right-wing Senator and then when the funeral takes place and the deceased is interred at the family mausoleum, to blow up the place as the president and a lot of top bigwigs are sure to attend.

The scheme involves tunneling from Jen's house to the mausoleum and We Were Strangers starts to resemble The Great Escape at this point. Jen's cooperative because her brother was killed by Machado's secret police, but something terribly unforeseen spoils things and the assassins are forced to flee.

In fact the something that is unforeseen should have been foreseen and Garfield should have come up with a better idea. But the drama of this film is the tension of these conspirators working together in close quarters and we the audience getting to know them. We Were Strangers at first, but they all become comrades during the shared experience of conspiracy. Besides John Garfield and Jennifer Jones, the other in the plot are Gilbert Roland, Wally Cassell, and David Bond.

Best performance in the film by far though is that of Pedro Armendariz as the secret police lieutenant. Huston might have seen Armendariz in a similar role in John Ford's The Fugitive which was set in Mexico. It was a good stroke of typecasting then because Armendariz is a truly hateful figure.

I looked up Gerardo Machado who was the president of Cuba at the time and he was overthrown in 1933 but not by these guys. Wikipedia describes him as an equal opportunity tyrant who had all factions hating him by 1933. He started out as a fighter and youngest general in the Cuban war for independence against Spain in the 1890s. But last year's freedom fighter has a way of turning into today's tyrant.

We Were Strangers in the Huston career comes between Key Largo and The Asphalt Jungle, both better films, but this one while the assassination plot is far fetched is carried along by the skilled direction of a fine group of players.

Dealing with Cuban revolutionaries a few years before Castro, the story line is tough, thoughtful, ironic. Jones(especially good as China Valdez) and Garfield are well teamed. Roland provides humor and bravado in a performance(one of his best)that balances the pace of the film's drama and action. The Mexican and American supporting players are all on the mark, a pleasure to watch. Huston directs with a consistent, steady hand; with knowledge and empathy in canvassing territory not easily accessed by the war weary now grown complacent audiences of 1949.

This film is an astounding anomaly to Hollywood film-making, in that it is openly supportive of armed revolutionary terrorism, even if it means the death of innocent people. And since it was made in 1949, by Columbia Pictures, just as the Hollywood Blacklist was beginning, it is even more unusual.

The quality of the film is first-rate—a taut, well-constructed thriller, with convincing characterizations by the actors and strong direction by John Huston. The fact that it is about Cuba, made 10 years before the victory of the Fidel Castro-led revolutionary forces, is more coincidence.

The revolutionaries are seen as intense fanatics, yes, but each with a justification for their zeal. They are seen as different from each other, occasionally at odds, but essentially united in their purpose. They openly discuss the rights and wrongs of revolutionary violence, and come to a consensus to go ahead.

Jennifer Jones is impressive, as are Gilbert Roland, Pedro Armendariz, and John Garfield. I can't think of another studio-made American feature like this one, worth seeing for both its quality and its unique place in American movies.