Based on a novel by Harry Brown, who neatly enough became a screenwriter and won an Oscar for his adaptation of A Place in the Sun. This is written by Robert Rossen and is apparently quite faithful to the source.
It's a tough, succinct and somehow poetic account of a WWII US Platoon's six mile trip to a farmhouse in Salerno, with quite limited battle scenes (a lot of the action is off-screen). Shot mainly on location (California plays Italy) with some studio stuff skilfully blended in. Milestone does that tracking shot thing familiar from All Quiet on the Western Front, but also favours long takes and two shots, whether with a fixed or tracking camera, particularly in dialogue with machine gunner Richard Conte and loader George Tyne. Dana Andrews is the sergeant who has to take over the platoon, from Matt Willis, who has a breakdown, and John Ireland is the letter-writer.
With Lloyd Bridges, Sterling Holloway, Norman Lloyd, Herbert Rudley, Richard Benedict.
Has a good down-to-earth feel - how they complete the mission when they've run out of cigarettes... And good laconic dialogue, such as:
"You're a travelling salesman selling democracy to the natives."
"Did you ever go camping in the woods?"
"What woods?"
and "Nobody dies."
Photographed by Russell Harlan.
Really good. And, you would have thought, a contender for one of Will's worthy war films.
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