SAHARA (1943)

I was surprised to learn, courtesy of this film which stars Humphrey Bogart, that the US Army were involved in the North Africa campaign in 1942. 

He’s in charge of a tank after a crushing defeat for the Allies.  The order is to regroup which means making tracks across part of the Sahara with precious little water.  In addition to two of his men Bogart has with him several Brits, as well as first an Italian prisoner and then a German prisoner.

There’s a dark moment early on when Bogart decides, given their shortage of water, to leave the Italian in the desert to die, but he then relents. It’s easily the most dramatically compelling sequence.

Fortunately one of the Brits is a Sudanese who has an intimate knowledge of the terrain including the location of the odd isolated well.  When they find one with some water Bogart gets the suicidal idea to defend the well to the death in order to hold up the advancing Germans.

After a couple of days of defiance the plot takes a curious turn in that Bogart and his ragged bunch of men have more or less run out of water but they do their best to pretend otherwise.  The purpose of this deception is to stop the Germans (who are themselves desperate for water) moving away to attack another target.  Eventually they are so debilitated and demoralised that they capitulate despite their overwhelming advantage in numbers.

So our guys are triumphant, as one would expect in a film coming out during the War.

It’s a serviceable and competently made film of its type (directed by Zoltán Korda) but it lacks any real distinction.  It’s a kind of mashup of ‘Ice Cold In Alex’ and ‘Zulu’ but with none of the unique qualities of those two classics.

Bogart holds the whole thing together, but although he’s always worth watching and he’s certainly not just going through the motions, he is playing a role that requires nothing special from him.

A shout out though to the cinematography which is of a high standard.  There’s a remarkable shot near the end of sand moving down the side of a dune which creates the illusion of water running down a rock face.

The other point of note is that the screenplay was written by John Howard Lawson who in 1950 became one of the 'Hollywood Ten' who were imprisoned for their communist views.  Some of Lawson's political leanings are apparent in this film in that it features cooperation between different nationalities, and a black character has a prominent role.

RATING: x Curb Your Enthusiasm