DESERT BATTLE

Our faithful Italian friends dabbled in just about every conceivable film genre and, despite being slaves to Yankee-inspired clichés always managed to get a different angle on often-told stories. In the late sixties while the spaghetti western was in full flow and, in the wake of American box-office smashes such as The Battle of the Bulge (61), a handful of war movies were made at Cinecitta. Produced by Luciano Martino and Mino Loy who, during the 70's, were responsible for an epic turnover of ultra-violent crime movies, Desert Battle proves to be just one of those unexpected gems.

Captain George Bradbury (George Hilton) is requested to lay mines along a strategic stretch of desert and does so with his expert platoon including Red Wiley (Frank Wolff), an unhinged Canadian who has chosen the British army instead of a British prison; Bob (Rik Battaglia), a motorcycle racing champion and Charlie (Fabrizio Moroni) young and deeply in love with a girl back home who's expecting his child. On their return to base, they find it under heavy artillery fire and must retreat into the desert. There they are chased by a German tank that breaks down allowing them to capture its occupants, Lieutenant Curt Heinz (Robert Hossein) and Hoffman (Ivano Staccioli). With the Germans in possession of a canister of water and the British with a jeep, the two opposing parties are forced to endure each other whilst the Germans are transported to an allied base. Of course, with no respite from the merciless heat of the sun, mutual hatred between the British and the Germans and Charlie injured and unable to walk, tensions flare and only one member of the party will ultimately survive.

Desert Battle isn't a conventional war film. It's not about preparation for a big battle so there's none of the inevitable heroics to take us through the last reel. Instead we follow a group of mismatched soldiers in extreme conditions unable to trust their quarry and each other. Filmed in Libya, the harsh conditions of the Second World War's desert battleground offer up limitless opportunities for this production to really push its dramatic edge. When there's a lull in the action, Loy just lets Zanni's visuals and Nicolai's stirring score propel the plot forward.

Ernesto Gastaldi always managed to sketch better characters than most of his compatriots at the time. All are well portrayed with the convenient use of flashbacks but none of this interferes with the thrust of the story. For some undisclosed reason Bradbury isn't given any history and, although he's the most honourable character of the lot, comes across as rather one-dimensional. George Hilton is in fine fettle in this role. With his hair greying at the temples he does well to establish his authority within a group of very fine actors and is well-suited to being a very English, very upper-class officer. His speeches and scenes with Hossein towards the end are superbly performed. Although they receive star billing, it's not Hilton or Hossein who steal the show. While Hoffman is the inevitable crazy German, the British also have a psycho in their midst in the form of Red Wiley and Frank Wolff literally smoulders underneath the scorching sun. Cynical, arrogant, maniacal but truly skilful it takes an actor like Wolff to chew what little scenery there is without falling into embarrassment. His final scenes, recklessly washing himself with what remains of the water canister and aiming his machine gun at both friend and foe are delectable.

The previous year saw Frank Wolff and Robert Hossein working with Sergio Leone on Once Upon a Time in the West (C'era una volta il West, 68) and Hossein directing one of my favourite spaghetti westerns Cemetary Without Crosses (Une corde, un Colt, 68) (Martino and Loy had a real knack of making the most of their production values. Desert Battle, being no exception, has a fine script, some of the best faces working in Italian cinema at the time, great cinematography and a musical score from one of the masters that would fit just as well in a western as it does in a war film. Delivering far more than it's rather lacklustre title suggests, Desert Battle is guaranteed to please fans of this golden period in European cinema.

Clark Hodgkiss