The Desert Rats (1953)

Director:

Robert Wise

Writer:

Richard Murphy (writer)

Release Date:

20 May 1953 (USA)

Genre:

Action | Adventure | Drama | History | War

Tagline:

They crawled their way across the blazing sands of Africa... to turn disaster into victory!

Plot:

Richard Burton plays a Scottish Army officer put in charge of a disparate band of ANZAC troops on the perimeter of Tobruk with the German Army doing their best to dislodge them.

Plot Keywords:

Rommel | WWII In Africa | Desert Rats | Armor | WWII

Awards:

Nominated for Oscar. Another 1 win

Cast

Richard Burton	...	Capt. 'Tammy' MacRoberts
Robert Newton	...	Tom Bartlett
Robert Douglas	...	General
Torin Thatcher	...	Colonel Barney White
Chips Rafferty	...	Sgt. 'Blue' Smith
Charles 'Bud' Tingwell	...	Lt. Harry Carstairs (as Charles Tingwell)
Charles Davis	...	Pete
Ben Wright	...	Mick
James Mason	...	Field Marshal Erwin von Rommel

Runtime:

88 min

Country:

USA

Language:

English | German

Color:

Black and White

Aspect Ratio:

1.37 : 1

Sound Mix:

Mono (Western Electric Recording)

Certification:

Netherlands:16 | Australia:G (DVD rating) | Canada:G (video rating) | New Zealand:PG | Australia:M | Sweden:15 | UK:U | USA:Approved (PCA #16243) | West Germany:12

Filming Locations:

Palm Springs, California, USA

Company:

Twentieth Century-Fox Film Corporation

Goofs:

Continuity: When the British aircraft are attacking German trucks carrying the prisoners, the planes shown in the distant shot are not the same planes as in the closeup. The planes in the closeup shot have black and white stripes painted on their wings, at the root and parallel to the fuselage. Such stripes were not used for identification until D-Day (they were called "invasion stripes" at the time) and then only in Europe.

Movie Connections:

Edited into All This and World War II (1976)

Unusually well done war flick - well worth a look

This is a really enjoyable movie. Burton and Newton do a fine job, as do a cast of familiar British character actors. James Mason in his first outing as Rommel is especially fun. He reprised the role in a later Rommel bio-pic (titled "The Desert Fox: The Story of Rommel").

Despite it's age, most of the attempts at special effects (artillery in the distance, explosions done via matte) come off well. As for the scenes where they really shoot off some pyrotechnics, they spared no expense! The overall portrait of the desert and army life looks very real and has the ring of truth. The plot is exciting and never drags.

The only problems are the over-patriotic script (I guess we should cut them some slack here, this movie was made much closer to the war than we are today!) and as noted elsewhere, the inappropriate German weapons. It's amazing that they used Thompson machine guns instead of MP40's, when for the next 30 years everybody from "The Man from U.N.C.L.E." to James Bond would use the MP40 all over the place. In summary I think this movie was a bit better than I expected and holds up well to repeated viewings.