Take the High Ground! (1953)

Pretty Good

Lack of good storyline.

Absolutely Fantastic

While it is a pity that the story wasn't told with more visual finesse, this is trivial compared to our real-world problems. It takes a good movie to put that into perspective.

Dull, Clichéd, and Uninteresting Boot Camp Movie with Nothing Much to say except these are America's Fighting Men and the Military is well, the Military. This is without doubt the most Boring Film Ever made about Drill Sergeants and the "Young People" They turn into Soldiers.Richard Widmark, Karl Malden, and Director Richard Brooks Can Not Save this Conservative Piece of Propaganda and elevate it beyond the Mundane. The Soldiers mostly Overact, especially Russ Tamblyn, and the Film is made in such a Pedestrian way that as Entertainment it Fails Miserably.Unlike the WWII Films of the Forties, This one, Ironically like the Korean Conflict, comes Off as Half Hearted, listless, and Uncommitted. It is Truly one of the most Unimpressive Movies ever made about the Military, Soldiers, or War. A Failure from Frame One.Note…The Movie does reflect the newly implemented integration of the Army and gives a Black Actor a prominent Role.

(No spoilers in this first paragraph.) The movie opens with a scene depicting a 1951 battle in Korea, Sgt. Thorne (Richard Widmark) is leading his men to take a high ridge held by enemy machine guns, when one of his men was shot and killed while stopping for a drink of water. They took the ridge after Thorne threw a grenade. Cut to 1953, training new Army recruits at Ft. Bliss near El Paso, Texas. Thorne's attitude is no matter how hard basic training is, war is even harder. The whole movie is about his desire to whip ragtag men into a strong, disciplined fighting group so that they will not be killed. A love interest is thrown in, Julie played by Elain Stewart, but the training of recruits is the thrust of this movie. Karl Malden also stars as the other Sergeant, Holt, subordinate to Thorne. Russ Tamblyn was featured as one of the recruits.Some spoilers follow in my miscellaneous observations.Much shown during basic training. Men are in chaos. Focus on Tamblyn who seems especially deficient but interesting. Training gets progressively harder, each recruit needs special attention. Rifle training by shooting through Widmark's wide spread legs, Tamblyn does his signature backflip on obstacle course, tear gas test for gas mask, horseplay in the barracks.On shooting range, Tamblyn is told he missed, "Missed? Must have gone through the same hole!" Night out, cross border to Mexico. Pretty girl (Julie) at bar with three recruits. Later Widmark suggests guys get back to base, getting late, she joins Malden and Widmark who take an interest, she mostly drunk, "property of US Army", they take her home, she passes out, put on couch, covered, they leave. Turns out she had left her Army husband who then was killed.Widmark's hard-ass style pits him against Malden, they scuffle."Darling, you can't try to have fun, you either have it or you don't" (Widmark to Julie)End of training, parade grounds, platoon has been transformed, precision unit, march in front of new recruits in disarray, "You poor miserable people will never make it!", as trained platoon boards the train. The cycle will repeat.

The 1957 Jack Webb classic, "The D.I." bears a close relationship to "Take the High Ground," from its general theme to the presence of an inept recruit, to the main character's romance with a young woman who lives close to the base.In the Jack Webb (Marine) version, Gunnery Sergeant Jim Moore (Webb) takes on a platoon with the usual selection of raw recruits, but one who is particularly troublesome. In the Richard Widmark (Army) version, the same thing happens, with a troublesome and troubled recruit. In both versions, the recruit makes an attempt to go over the wall, and in both versions, the tough but compassionate training sergeant stops the escape and molds the recruit into shape.In both versions, the love interest is a woman who has been emotionally scarred by a former romance with a serviceman who had been killed in combat.In both versions, there is a fellow training sergeant that frustrates and annoys the main character into a showdown fistfight.At the end of both movies, the cast is reprised, with their names. The only difference is that in the MGM version (Take the High Ground), the entire platoon are actors. In the Mark VII version (The D.I.), the platoon was played by real Marines. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~' For those unfamiliar with military lingo, "boot camp" is generally used to refer to Navy recruit training (or Marine training), whereas the Army uses the term "Basic Training." In a similar vein, the Navy refers to combat simulation encampments as "maneuvers," whereas the Army uses the term "bivouac."Both movies are excellent films.

While this may not be the movie that made me want to join the Army in 1956, it may have helped. The plot is a formulaic coming of age in basic training story, turning boys into men. The personal interactions and love affairs of Widmark and Malden, the veterans of Korea who are now leading a trainng platoon at Fort Bliss, Texas, next to El Paso are also formulaic.The real value of this picture is as a time capsule. Nothing herein is BS, dreamed up, or recreated such as are Platoon, or Full Metal Jacket or Apocalypse Now, to mention some more modern highly praised but highly fictionalized films. Nor is it an anachronistic mish mash such or a low budget BW cheapie such as many of that period were.Everything shown here is as it was at the time of filming and the background extras and other military individuals were actually going through infantry training with the real possibility of going to combat in Korea when it was being made. (An amusing aspect is that the opening scene of the newly arrived trainees and the disciplined troops entraining for their new assignments were filmed on the same day with the same Southern Pacific locomotive and equipment. Yet supposedly took place three months apart.)Other time capsule films of the time are Bombers B-57, and Strategic Air Command, which prove that officially approved films can be entertaining and informative both.