Tuesday, April 28, 2015

Movie review - "Rogue's March" (1952) **

You would have thought that pro British Empire takes would have gone out of fashion after World War two, and for the most part they did, but there was a brief up-surge in the 1950s - in part because of the box office success of Kim, British Empire tales offering opportunities for colourful adventure tales in cinemascope, but also because the rise of communism I think made the US regard British Imperialism more fondly - at least, historical imperalism. So you had Bengal Brigade, King of the Khyber Rifles and this effort, which was written and produced by Leo Gordon, who worked on Kim.

Unfortunately it's not as good (even though Kim was hardly a classic) - despite a solid story: a British officer from a good family and with a taste for gambling is falsely accused of selling secrets to the Russians. He gets the boot from his regiment and is sentenced to prison, but escapes, re-enlists as a private in another regiment, and redeems himself on the Khyber Pass.

Now that's a great set up - a knock off of The Four Feathers, with opportunities to revenge, action, redemption, etc. But its' done in by several things - low budget, black and white photography, Peter Lawford in the lead (he was no leading man at the best of times and is hopelessly out of his depth in a role that cries out for Steward Granger or Errol Flynn, or even Robert Taylor/Jeff Chandler/Rock Hudson... someone who doesn't look like a lounge lizard), slack handling. Janice Rule is a dud as the girl who loves Lawford and Richard Greene blends into the scenery as Lawford's best friend/rival.

So many moments you think would be key are missed: establishing strongly that Lawford is a wastrel, a sense of progression from playboy for real soldier, the escape sequence, a sense of suspense. Lawford is given a potentially interesting character but it isn't developed; everyone else is a stock type.

There is a decent battle at the end and Leo G. Carroll is excellent as Lawford's unforgiving father. And the story works.

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