Battle Zone

I've just watched this on the Fast32 streaming service. Very ordinary as war films go, though there's the novelty that it's about a Marine team that films combat action, sometimes with little regard for their own safety. Did they really use those clunky stills cameras?

The love interest was contrived, and I was unconvinced that the footage they took behind the lines would have been of much use.

John Hodiak and Stephen McNally do well enough.

As much as bronco riders hate to see rodeo clowns because they show up after injuries, combat photographers held the most hated jobs in World War 2 since they took photos of troops killed in action. So, it seemed a stretch to make a film about heroic combat photographers. I found the frequent grinning of Hodiak and McNally uncomfortable from the start. They certainly defy logic to run on the battlefield with large 1920's era cameras, giving away locations of their own eagerly while they photograph secret enemy locations. Linda Christian is given the romantic interest of someone you might meet 15 minutes waiting to see the doctor only once, never to be seen again. No hugs, kisses, come on brave boys, you can do better than that!

John Hodiak and Stephen McNally star as a pair of Marine combat photographers who are sent to Korea and the war seems just a big old bit of hijinks for them. McNally stayed in the corps and is now a sergeant. But Hodiak left after World War II and re-enlisted. But before that made sure he came back in as a sergeant with one more rocker on his sleeve. That is a bone of contention between him and McNally, but it's far from the only one.

They're also rivals over an Italian nurse they met in World War II, Linda Christian. Now I'm not aware of any Marines in the Italian theater in World War II, but this is a B film from Allied Artists. These two keep trying to top themselves to impress her.

The climax is when the two and their unit get stuck behind the lines and get some great footage the better when Matt Ridgeway starts retaking territory. It's all on the GI Joe level of combat.

I wasn't expecting much and was not disappointed with Battle Zone.

1952's "Battle Zone" came from Poverty Row's Allied Artists, a Korean War programmer featuring native Korean Philip Ahn (Master Kan on KUNG FU) fighting the good fight in one of Hollywood's earliest efforts on the Korean front. There is the usual love triangle, between John Hodiak, Stephen McNally, and Linda Christian, compensated by the main storyline focusing on the filmmakers responsible for taking the battlefield footage, risking their lives right alongside the soldiers. Linda Christian, one of Mexico's loveliest exports, was just rekindling the career that began with "Tarzan and the Mermaids," while Stephen McNally went on to play the villainous one eyed Count opposite Richard Greene and Boris Karloff in "The Black Castle." Many of these early Allied Artists titles have been difficult to find, as Monogram was trying to upgrade their stature, despite the continuation of the Bowery Boys series. Curiously, this war picture was among five that aired on Pittsburgh's Chiller Theater during the 1969-70 season, alternating between straight films, often Italian, and more typical genre fare. Ironically, "Battle Zone" turned out to be the very last non horror item broadcast that year, on April 18 1970, paired with Larry Buchanan's "Zontar the Thing from Venus." Linda Christian's best known horror title, "The Devil's Hand," from Crown International, was a far more frequent guest on Chiller Theater.

Unrealistic cheesy film, but as a former Marine who was once stationed at Camp Pendleton, I enjoyed seeing it along with the real archival combat footage dubbed in this movie. Unmentioned is the short life expectancy of USMC combat photographers. My father led a 14-man USMC combat photography squad in WW II through Saipan, Guam, and Okinawa. They were all KIA except for my father who was WIA on Okinawa having been shot through his shoulder and sent to a field hospital. I wonder if he ever saw this movie but I doubt it; he tried to forget his wartime memories. Because of his experience, when I announced on my 17th birthday that I was joining the Marines, my father exclaimed "congratulations son! You're joining the world's largest suicide squad!" I still have his Purple Heart medal, the only thing he kept after 4 years in the Corps.