Secret Command

Lightweight Propaganda that is Family Friendly Fodder and Heavy on the Irish-are-Americans Theme, as well as the Need to Include those Cute Kids as a Reminder of what We are Fighting for. Speaking of Fighting, those Irish will Fight at Any Opportunity. They will Fight and Argue with Family Members, Friends, Co-Workers and even the Nazis.

In the Middle of the Movie it Stops Dead to Include a Scene where the Shipbuilders Remove their Welder's Helmets so the Audience can See Everyone is Doing their Part...Negroes...Women...and an Oriental (had to be Chinese because the Japanese were in Internment Camps).

Pat O'Brien is Miscast Again Playing a Hunk that Every Woman on Screen Pines. Ridiculous. The Frumpy, Overweight, Hardly Handsome "Star", should have Traded Places with Chester Morris and it would have Worked a Whole Lot Better.

Carol Landis is a Sleek Beauty and some of the Cinematography is Above Average. Overall it is a Watchable Piece of Propaganda Fluff that is Neither that Suspenseful or Intriguing. In the Prolog it is Mentioned that America is Building Sturdy Ships, Honest Ships. What Exactly is an Honest Ship?

Enjoyed viewing Carole Landis in the 1941 picture,"I Wake Up Screaming" and greatly enjoyed her performance in this film where she was so young, pretty and happy as a wife, (Jill McGann) to her husband Sam Gallagher, (Pat O'Brien) and a sweet funny little girl and boy to complete their lovely family. Sam Gallagher had a brother played by Chester Morris, (Jeff Gallagher) who did not see each other for years and wound up meeting each other in a ship yard which was building an aircraft carrier during WW II. Jeff Gallagher becomes suspicious of his brother Sam and for some reason does not believe he is married to Jill McGann and wonders just what his brother is up to. Jeff does not trust his brother and they both have a good fight in which both of the brothers get all beaten up. This is a great spy picture, but I still think Pat O'Brien was too old to act with Carole Landis or even marry her. Good Spy Film in 1944.

Government agent Pat O'Brien goes undercover at a shipyard where his estranged brother Chester Morris works. Pat's trying to root out Nazi saboteurs. Part of his cover is that stunning Carole Landis pretends to be his wife. Something tells me they didn't have to twist Pat's arm to take this assignment. The look on Pat's face when he comes home to see Carole in her tight-fitting dress is priceless. Well paced WW2 espionage movie with a decent script and likable leads. Very nice supporting cast includes Ruth Warrick, Barton MacLane, Tom Tully, and Wallace Ford. One of those little hidden gems you come across on TCM every once in awhile. A must-see for Carole Landis fans.

There are some great scenes at the wharf with shootouts and manhunting and some very hard fights with sledge knuckles and some water incidents - the greatest scene is the rescuing of a man falling down from a great height, and the greatest combat is also in the water with one man drowning, but everything is rather predictable. It's about sabotaging a wharf building ships for transporting American soldiers over seas, and the Nazis are really bad guys, not hesitating to shoot to kill. Fortunately there are also some women involved (the beautiful Carole Landis) and some very sweet kids, who contribute in saving the film. It is worth watching but only barely, mainly for the dramatic fights and incidents at the wharf, but any propaganda film of 1943 could of course only end one way.

This film is a slight departure for its star, Pat O'Brien, because in this film he is an undercover agent trying to expose saboteurs at a ship-building plant. He gets a job doing "grunt work" but really is outside his element--since he knows nothing about ships or machinery. His brother, Chester Morris, has no idea why Pat wants this job, but reluctantly hires him. It's obvious there is some bad blood between them, though exactly what it is doesn't ever get explained. However, Morris and the rest of the guys at the plant give him a pretty hard time until he eventually proves himself. To make the ruse more believable, Pat is set up with an instant family--a pretend wife and two cute little pretend kids who are actually war orphans. Over time, Pat can't help but love the pretend family--and looking at them, I could certainly see why.

At the plant, almost no one knows O'Brien is an agent. His contact there is Wallace Ford--who has already started to infiltrate the gang of Nazis planning on sabotaging something--exactly what and when are unknown. How this all comes together in the end is very exciting and kept my attention. In fact, the movie was so well-written and tense that it managed to somehow rise above the genre and is STILL an excellent drama...and I LOVED the ending even though it was a tad "schmaltzy".