Saturday, September 29, 2007

Movie review - Ladd #9 - "OSS" (1946) ***

OSS movies came in vogue briefly just after WW2 - Cloak and Dagger was another one. This is intelligent and exciting, well written by Richard Maibaum. Alan Ladd is professional in the lead but is miscast - he has such a distinct tough guy personality, you simply wouldn't believe him as a spy in Occupied France - spies should blend in, be a bit more anonymous. I wouldn't have a problem with Alan Ladd leading a mission to blow something up, say, but not go undercover. Also there is some tiresome conflict with Geraldine Fitzgerald - he doesn't like having her along on the mission because she's a skirt, which fits in with Ladd's "I don't trust dames but then eventually I'll melt for one" persona, but doesn't make sense here, because surely everyone in war time knew that women made good spies?

This is full of interesting bits of spy business - a pipe that turns into a gun, how to put a bomb on a train - foreshadowing Maibaum's later work on the James Bond series (he the great unsung hero of that series, Maibaum). You might laugh at the scene where the spy instructor says "America isn't used to playing dirty tricks like other countries so we have to work to catch up". Well, they certainly did!

Structurally the film is too episodic - "do this mission, then that mission". At the end Ladd and Fitzgerald are about to get on a plane when Patric Knowles turns up and says "just one more mission" meaning there's another 15 minutes to go and Ladd's annoyed and you're likely to be, too (though it's a good scene that follows - Ladd telling Knowles he's not going to volunteer, he's got to be ordered to go). The film also features a classic "you're going to die" moment when Ladd and Fitzgerald do this big separation scene even though they both think he's just going away for a few hours - big kisses, promises, he looks back at her longingly as he walks out the door... the film couldn't say more clearly that ONE OF THESE CHARACTERS IS GOING TO DIE. (There is some suspense, though, as Ladd often died in his movies so it could be him.)

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