CORREGIDOR (1943)

A Poverty Row war movie that tried to capitalize on the tragic real-life events in the Philippines in the early days of WWII. According to the book "Star Spangled Screen," the Office of War Information gave the film's studio, PRC, a great deal of help in making the film, but it doesn't show, partly because all the government help in the world couldn't overcome a lack of imagination in direction and writing, and partly because the movie isn't really a war story or even an effective war propaganda film, but is instead a run-of-the-mill romantic triangle between three army doctors. Ellisa Landi (best known as the Christian heroine of De Mille's SIGN OF THE CROSS) is a doctor who has flown out to the island of Manoi in early December of 1941 to marry her suitor (Otto Kruger); in the middle of the wedding ceremony, the Japanese bombard the island from the air and our couple winds up on Corregidor where they run into Landi's former beau, Donald Woods. There is apparently still some spark between Landi and Woods, but we have to take that on faith since their bland acting (and, to be fair, weak writing) gives us little to go on for character motivation. Moderately more interesting is the romantic subplot between nurse Wanda McKay and soldier Rick Vallin, who are less stiff in the acting department than the leads. Frank Jenks, a familiar face from dozens of 30's and 40's films, provides some strained comic relief. The contemporary audience would have known that all concerned were doomed, as the U.S. ultimately retreated and abandoned the island to the Japanese; here, Landi is evacuated on the last boat out and we assume that everyone else will die or be held as prisoners. The movie is supposed to have a stirring epilogue written by poet Alfred Noyes, but that was missing from the print I saw on the Marathon DVD--in fact, it looks like the entire last reel except for "The End" title card was gone, so this version has an incredibly uninspiring ending with soldiers in tears hearing about the retreat. There is some newsreel footage of Japanese bombers, and some poorly done scenes of hand-to-hand combat in the jungles. Kruger has an inane grin on his face all the time, so whether he's happy, sad, or in love, he just comes off as stupefied. Landi looks like a drab Katharine Hepburn and isn't much better than Kruger. Both have given decent performances elsewhere, so I have to blame the director, William Nigh. Edgar Ulmer co-wrote the screenplay. Even as a fan of B-movie war propaganda, I was sorely disappointed in this. [DVD]