Battle Zone

During the Korean War, Danny Young (John Hodiak) and Mitch Turner (Stephen McNally) are Marine war photographers fighting over Red Cross nurse Jeanne (Linda Christian). The war lasts longer than expected especially after the Red Chinese.

This is a weak war film. I don't care about these characters. The actors are non-descript. They don't have much charisma. The story is uninspiring. The combat scenes are either stock footage or weak action. I do like some of the stock footage, but the action filming is pretty weak. I'm guessing they filmed this in California. Maybe they're higher up for the snowy scenes.

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.

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!

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.

This is the far most unbearable, awful movie from Lesley Selander I have ever seen; I say Lesley Selander because he is the director here, but it would have been the same with ANY director, regarding the emptiness of this garbage junk. This a war film? Let me laugh...CROSS OF IRON, ATTACK, THE LONGEST DAY, BRIDGE OVER THE RIVER KWAI were actually war films. This is boring, talkative, and this lousy John Hodiak as a lead.... Lesley Selander was a western film maker, though he also gave us several war films, just bearable - not more - a science fiction flick - lousy but fun, and a good adventure film: ROYAL AFRICAN RIFLES. Except his fifties decade westerns and, I almost forgot, I WAS AN AMERICAN SPY, don't lose your time with Lesley Selander's filmography.