THE GREATEST BATTLE aka THE BIGGEST BATTLE aka THE GREAT BATTLE aka BATTLE FORCE (Italy - 1978) Directed by Umberto Lenzi. Written by Umberto Lenzi and Cesare Frugoni. Cast: Helmut Berger, Samantha Eggar, Giuliano Gemma, John Huston, Stacy Keach, Ray Lovelock, Henry Fonda, Edwige Fenech, Evelyn Stewart (Ida Galli), Aldo Massasso, Venantino Venantini, Guy Doleman, Patrick Reynolds, Rik Battaglia, Andrea Bosic, Giuseppe Castellano, Luciano Catenacci, Giovanni Cianfriglia, Geoffrey Copleston, Tom Felleghy, Manfred Freyberger, Marco Guglielmi, Fulvio Mingozzi, Giacomo Rossi Stuart, Bill Vanders, Robert Spafford, Olga Pehar Lenzi. (PG, 102 mins) WWII movies were extremely popular all over the world from the mid-1960s through the 1970s, and journeyman Italian director Umberto Lenzi was no stranger to the genre. He'd already made "macaroni combat" movies like 1967's DESERT COMMANDOS and 1969's BATTLE OF THE COMMANDOS in response to the 1967 blockbuster THE DIRTY DOZEN, but then he moved into gialli like 1972's SEVEN BLOODSTAINED ORCHIDS and really hit his stride with a string of ridiculously entertaining and extraordinarily violent poliziotteschi like 1974's ALMOST HUMAN and 1976's ROME ARMED TO THE TEETH among many others. But between his crime movies and his jumping on the post-CANNIBAL HOLOCAUST gut-muncher bandwagon with 1980's EATEN ALIVE and 1981's CANNIBAL FEROX, Lenzi cranked out two more "macaroni combat" films. Differing from the DIRTY DOZEN-inspired "men on a mission" formula of his late '60s genre contributions, 1978's THE GREATEST BATTLE and 1979's FROM HELL TO VICTORY (which starred George Peppard and George Hamilton, the same year he had a huge hit with LOVE AT FIRST BITE) seemed like responses to the more large-scale, all-star ensemble epics that were being produced at that time, like 1976's MIDWAY, 1976's THE EAGLE HAS LANDED, and 1977's A BRIDGE TOO FAR. Both films had casts of big-name actors who carried significantly more prestige than you'd expect in a run-of-the-mill Italian knockoff, but from the looks of THE GREATEST BATTLE, the entire budget went to paying those actors because for the most part, it looks like how a WWII epic might turn out if it was directed by Jess Franco or Al Adamson.
THE GREATEST BATTLE was shown under a plethora of different titles: it was shot in Rome, Almeria, and Los Angeles in 1977 as IL GRANDE ATTACCO, and then alternately known as THE BIGGEST BATTLE (the title it carries on Amazon Prime), THE GREAT BATTLE, and BATTLE FORCE, but THE GREATEST BATTLE is what it initially went by when drive-in outfit Dimension Pictures released it in the US, cut down to 90 minutes, with Lenzi pseudonym "Humphrey Longan" credited as director, and with added narration by Orson Welles, who's not heard on the complete 102-minute, English-dubbed BIGGEST BATTLE version streaming on Amazon (dubbing fixture Anthony La Penna handles some incidental narration in a few spots). Stacy Keach is among the stars, and in his very enjoyable 2013 memoir All in All, he refers to the film under yet another title, THE MARETH LINE, and calls it "flat-out awful." A fair assessment, though as Keach points out, "It gave me a chance to work with Henry Fonda and John Huston," and they're only a few of the reputable actors called upon to star in a film by the future director of CITY OF THE WALKING DEAD, MAKE THEM DIE SLOWLY, and FATTY GIRL GOES TO NEW YORK. THE GREATEST BATTLE opens in Berlin in 1936 just after the Olympics, as a small group of friendly acquaintances meet for a formal dinner: German Major Manfred Roland (Keach), British war correspondent Sean O'Hara (Huston, not even attempting a British accent) and his wife (Lenzi's wife Olga Pehar Lenzi), West Point legend General Foster (Fonda), and renowned German actress Annelise Ackermann (Samantha Eggar). They discuss the rise of Hitler and his disdain of Jews and "American negroes" in the wake of Jesse Owens' Olympic triumph, but all parties foolishly conclude that everything is fine, that war is unlikely and they'll all be friends for many years to come.
Cut to 1942, and the entire world is at war. From then on, THE GREATEST BATTLE is an episodic and seemingly random series of vignettes that eventually form some semblance of a story but it still feels choppy and haphazardly-assembled. There's copious amounts of stock footage from newsreels and other movies, and sometimes the various film stocks don't even match. Foster's son John (Ray Lovelock) has enlisted after flunking out of college, unable to win over his old man like his older, war hero brother Ted (never seen, but played by a framed photo of future CEMETERY MAN director Michele Soavi); Roland and Annelise are now married, but he's conflicted about pledging his allegiance to Der Fuhrer and the Nazi party and determined to keep Annelise's being half-Jewish a secret from his superiors. We also meet other characters who have nothing to do with the initial expository set-up of the Berlin dinner, such as British Capt. Martin Scott (Giuliano Gemma), his ex-wife (Ida Galli) and her new husband (Venantino Venantini), and German Lt. Kurt Zimmer (Helmut Berger), who's fallen in love with French prostitute Danielle (Edwige Fenech) who may or may not be a member of the Resistance. Some of these people cross paths, and some of them don't. Huston's O'Hara is the most confusing character of them all, a grouchy old cynic who seems far too old to be playing a roving war correspondent chasing a story at the center of the action, and it's anyone's guess why some characters occasionally refer to him as "Professor O'Hara" or why he's shown strutting around and barking orders at some officers in one scene. Huston--just four years removed from co-starring in CHINATOWN--doesn't even seem to know or care what he's doing, as he has one of the most jaw-dropping exits you'll ever see, a barely-concealed breaking of the fourth wall, almost as if he said "Alright, Lenzi, I'm done here...I'll show myself out of this movie." In between the Ovidio G. Assonitis classics TENTACLES and THE VISITOR, Huston isn't even hiding his disinterest in THE GREATEST BATTLE, further evidenced by an anecdote Keach shares in his memoir. Concerned about not overdoing his German accent and having difficulty communicating with Lenzi, who didn't speak English, Keach asked Huston, his director on 1972's FAT CITY and THE LIFE AND TIMES OF JUDGE ROY BEAN, for some advice. Huston replied "I'm only an actor here. I didn't ask you about my accent. Talk to the director," adding "Learn Italian or find an interpreter."
Speaking of TENTACLES, both Huston and Fonda appeared in that 1977 Italian JAWS ripoff about a giant mutant octopus, though they shared no scenes. Fonda has a few fleeting appearances scattered throughout TENTACLES, always on the phone yelling at someone. His entire role was shot in one morning at his house, and his dialogue is vague enough ("Well, take care of it!") that I remain convinced he had no idea he was in a movie about a giant mutant octopus. While Fonda gets out a bit in THE GREATEST BATTLE in both the opening dinner sequence and the closing scene at a cemetery, the rest of his appearances are, once again, by himself and on the phone in what looks suspiciously like a very 1970s Beverly Hills home in which a famous movie star might reside. Was this Fonda's thing prior to capping his stellar career with ON GOLDEN POND? Forcing journeymen Italian directors to make house calls if they wanted him in their movie? THE GREATEST BATTLE makes a lot of noise but very little sense, jumping from place to place with an ensemble whose members vanish for long stretches or right after they're introduced. The supporting cast is an impressive who's who of jobbing Italian supporting actors who always turn up in this sort of genre fare (I'm pretty sure Tom Felleghy owned that general's uniform, and having gravelly-voiced dubber Robert Spafford appear on camera as Gen. George S. Patton was an inspired choice), but the performances of the main cast are all over the map, with Huston looking visibly inconvenienced and demonstrably irritable in a way that borders on acting out, and Fonda mostly phoning it in TENTACLES-style (oddly, in Tony Thomas' 1983 Citadel Press-published The Complete Films of Henry Fonda, THE GREATEST BATTLE was absent even though his role is considerably more than a cameo, and in the early days of pay cable, this aired on HBO quite often). Berger is relatively restrained, considering his reputation and that he'd recently been in the 1976 Nazisploitation epic SALON KITTY, though if anyone can figure out why he and Fenech are even in this, let me know. The usually reliable Eggar is absolutely awful, but for whatever reason, Keach, the same year he co-starred in Sergio Martino's vile MOUNTAIN OF THE CANNIBAL GOD, is trying a lot harder than his other big-name co-stars and is the only one who seems interested in creating a three-dimensional character, even if the sloppiness of Lenzi's direction and the scattered script by Lenzi and Cesare Frugoni give him little with which to work. Franco Micalizzi's by-the-numbers "rousing" score lacks the maestro's usual catchy pizazz, and some of the miniatures in the battle sequences would make Antonio Margheriti cringe and look away in embarrassment. But for fans of "macaroni combat" movies, there's plenty of action sequences and a lot of big and loud explosions. Just don't expect it to make much sense. Maybe that's why Huston looks like he's breaking character and literally walking out of the movie.
With the possible exception of Umberto Lenzi's incredible 1976 Maurizio Merli ragefest ROME ARMED TO THE TEETH (aka THE TOUGH ONES), the director's ALMOST HUMAN is probably the greatest of the 1970s Italian poliziotteschi crime movies. Astonishingly mean and unrepentantly nasty, even with some of its more transgressive offenses--the main villain forcing a male hostage to blow him at gunpoint--clearly implied but taking place offscreen, ALMOST HUMAN exists on its own special plane of misanthropy. Tomas Milian is Giulio Sacchi, a vile worm of a whining, pathetic lowlife in Milan's underworld, a twitchy loose screw and a psychotic fuck-up who can't even handle the simplest task without losing his shit--he overreacts and kills cops on two separate occasions in the first ten minutes of the movie--and causing trouble for boss Majone (Luciano Catenacci). Full of self-aggrandizing hot air and tired of small scores and subsisting on Majone's table scraps, Giulio pressures his dim-witted sometime-girlfriend Iona (Anita Strindberg) for information on Mary Lou (Laura Belli), the daughter of her wealthy boss Porrino (Guido Alberti), with the intention of kidnapping her for a hefty ransom. Because Giulio and his equally thick-skulled, impulsive sidekicks Carmine (Ray Lovelock) and Vittorio (Gino Santercole) can't do anything right, the entire plan collapses on itself, and with a quickly-escalating body count, it's only a matter of time before angry detective Grandi (Henry Silva) realizes Giulio is behind all the mayhem.
Shot under the Italian MILANO ODIA, which translates literally to the very appropriate "Milan Hates," the film was released in the US by Joseph Brenner from 1975 to 1979 under a variety of titles like THE KIDNAP OF MARY LOU and THE DEATH DEALER. Brenner relaunched it again in 1980 under the ALMOST HUMAN moniker, which saw the film absurdly being sold as a horror movie ("It doesn't matter how loud you scream"). That title seems to have stuck and is what the film is best known by these days, but not since career con man Edward L. Montoro's Film Ventures released 1973's acid-bathed RICCO THE MEAN MACHINE in the US in 1979 as THE CAULDRON OF DEATH ("Pray it doesn't happen to you!") was a Eurotrash crime movie more fraudulently peddled to unsuspecting audiences. ALMOST HUMAN is a masterpiece of seething rage and completely unlikable characters. Even the "hero"--Silva's irate Grandi--is a hot-tempered asshole, but he's the most upstanding asshole around (and nobody, and I mean nobody--not even Samuel L. Jackson--belts out a "motherfucker" like Henry Silva). Even dubbed by veteran voice actor Frank von Kuegelgen, Milian is one of the most weaselly, loathsome bad guys you'll ever see, one whose quick solution to everything is to make matters even worse and dig the hole deeper. To say he gets his comeuppance in the best possible location is an understatement, and a scathing critique on exactly what Lenzi and screenwriter Ernesto Gastaldi thought of the character. It's foul, it's trashy, and there's no redeeming qualities to any of its characters--in other words, ALMOST HUMAN is mandatory viewing, and an excellent place to start if you're new to the demented joys of poliziotteschi. (R, 99 mins)
MEET HIM AND DIE (Italy/West Germany - 1976) Directed by Franco Prosperi. Written by Peter Berling, Antonio Cucca, Claudio Fragasso, Alberto Marras. Cast: Ray Lovelock, Martin Balsam, Elke Sommer, Riccardo Cucciolla, Ettore Manni, Heinz Domez, Ernesto Colli, Peter Berling. (Unrated, 94 mins)
Raro USA has done a fine job bringing cult classic 1970s poliziotteschi and other Eurocult gems to DVD and Blu-ray over the last few years, frequently in comprehensive, near Criterion-level packaging (their first box set of Fernando Di Leo crime films, featuring CALIBER 9, THE ITALIAN CONNECTION, THE BOSS, and RULERS OF THE CITY is absolutely essential). There have been stumbles along the way: a pressing error caused the entire run of Massimo Dallamano's THE SECRET OF DORIAN GRAY (1970) to be recalled, the DVD release of Di Leo's TO BE TWENTY (1978) had a glitch that causes it to skip the last chapter of the film, forcing you to go to the chapter selections to see the end of the movie, and their recent Blu-ray release of Umberto Lenzi's NIGHTMARE CITY (1980) has been knocked for its subpar transfer that doesn't even look as good as the decade-plus-old Anchor Bay DVD. You can't knock them all out of of the park, but their edition of MEET HIM AND DIE is an unmitigated disaster of shit-the-bed proportions.
The movie itself is fine--it's not the best polizia and it's not where one should start when exploring the subgenre, but it's an entertaining action thriller. The plot is filled with shootouts, double-crosses, and some nicely-done chase sequences. Massimo (Ray Lovelock of LIVE LIKE A COP, DIE LIKE A MAN) is busted for holding up a jewelry store and sent to prison. It's revealed very early that he's actually an undercover cop, ostensibly posing as a criminal to help orchestrate an escape for incarcerated mob boss Giulianelli (Martin Balsam), who's still overseeing his smuggling operation from the inside and the cops know there's bigger fish to catch. But Massimo's ultimate goal is to use Giulianelli to get to Perrone (Ettore Manni), who employs the two goons who shot and paralyzed his mother. From the action to the memorable score by Ubaldo Continiello to--if you watch the English track--the appearances of all the usual suspects in the dubbing world (Balsam--the same year he co-starred in ALL THE PRESIDENT'S MEN--dubs himself, while Lovelock is voiced by Ted Rusoff, and Elke Sommer turns up about an hour in and is dubbed by Pat Starke), MEET HIM AND DIE is a perfectly serviceable polizia. There's nothing new here, but fans will find a lot to enjoy.
That is, if they can get past the botched transfer. Whether it was Raro's doing or them just working with what they had, the DNR (digital noise reduction) here is off-the-charts. It's as bad as the infamous PREDATOR Blu-ray. In the long shots, it actually looks sort-of OK, but close-ups of the actors--and director Franco Prosperi (more on him in a bit) uses a lot of close-ups--look like they're coated in a waxy glaze, all lines and definition completely removed as everyone just has a smooth, lifeless appearance, surrounded by garish, overly-bright colors. All the grain has been removed, with a fake grain sort-of "hovering" over the image (Blue Underground's Blu-ray release of Dario Argento's THE CAT O'NINE TAILS is a horrific example of this), and it's most noticeable whenever Riccardo Cucciolla (as Massimo's boss) is on screen--watch how the designs on his loud sport jackets sort of move. Sure, there are some moments where it's not awful-looking, but for the most part, this is a horribly ugly transfer and indicative of everything people misunderstand about the concept of high-definition. This is not how movies should look. This is not how film looks, especially when it's one from the mid-1970s. It's anti-HD.
As if the transfer and the absurd levels of DNR weren't bad enough, Raro completely embarrasses itself with the accompanying booklet. There's an essay about the film by polizia expert Mike Malloy, who recently directed the documentary EUROCRIME, which looks at the genre and interviews virtually every still-living actor who appeared in them. Malloy obviously knows his shit, and his essay, as well as a video segment in the bonus features where he talks about the movie, the actors, and the subgenre itself, are nicely-done (I liked his description of the Italians latching on to what was popular--peplum, spaghetti westerns, crime movies--and "strip-mining" it until everyone was completely exhausted with it). But there's also a two-page bio of Prosperi and an accompanying filmography, and here lies the problem: as strange as it seems, there were two Franco Prosperi's working in Italian cinema from the 1960s to the 1980s. The MEET HIM AND DIE Prosperi was a genre and exploitation journeyman who dabbled in a little of everything over his mostly unexceptional career (007 ripoffs in the '60s, horror films in the '70s, and CONAN ripoffs in the '80s). The two-page bio is for the other Franco Prosperi, best known for co-directing, with Gualtiero Jacopetti, the MONDO CANE documentaries. The filmography listed after the bio? That's for the correct (MEET HIM AND DIE) Franco Prosperi. Now, I don't expect the general public to know (or care) that there are two very different Franco Prosperi's--I didn't know until a few years ago and even the most hardcore Eurotrash disciple has gotten them confused at some point in their travels. But shouldn't someone at Raro maybe not fallen asleep at the wheel? Was anyone paying attention? Was anyone in charge of proofreading or fact-checking? Did they even watch the video that Malloy shot for them? Because he specifically mentions the "two different Franco Prosperi's" phenomenon and he specifically says "The director of MEET HIM AND DIE is not the guy who made MONDO CANE." Can you imagine Criterion ever making a gaffe that egregious? Did anyone not find it odd that the bio of Prosperi made no mention of the film in which it's packaged? Malloy is the only credited author of the booklet, but it's obvious from his video segment that he didn't write the bio, since he knows it's not the correct Prosperi. So, between the shitty picture quality and the careless packaging, is there any reason at all to get behind this tire fire of a Blu-ray release? The relatively obscure MEET HIM AND DIE (which may have had some brief US exposure under the title RISKING) is far from essential, but even the worst polizia deserves better than what it gets here: a release that does nothing for the film, the genre, either Franco Prosperi, or Raro USA's sinking reputation. This whole package is riddled with the kind of bush-league fuck-ups that make you hesitant to purchase anything else they release in the future. Get it together, guys.
Directed by George Pan Cosmatos. Written by Tom Mankiewicz, Robert Katz and George Pan Cosmatos. Cast: Sophia Loren, Richard Harris, Burt Lancaster, Ava Gardner, Martin Sheen, O.J. Simpson, Ingrid Thulin, Lee Strasberg, Lionel Stander, Ann Turkel, Lou Castel, John Phillip Law, Ray Lovelock, Alida Valli, Tom Hunter, Stefano Patrizi, Carlo De Mejo, Fausta Avelli, Angela Goodwin, Renzo Palmer, John P. Dulaney. (R, 129 mins)
SPOILERS DISCUSSED THROUGHOUT
Disaster movies were one of the signature genres of 1970s cinema. Though the concept wasn't new and dated back to the early days of the movies to SAN FRANCISCO (1936) and 1950s hits like THE HIGH AND THE MIGHTY (1954) and ZERO HOUR! (1957), and would continue later with the likes of ARMAGEDDON (1998), THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW (2004) and 2012 (2008), the subgenre really exploded in the 1970s. Starting with box-office blockbusters like AIRPORT (1970), THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE (1972) and THE TOWERING INFERNO (1974) to less-popular but still entertaining later offerings like the sniper-in-a-football-stadium TWO-MINUTE WARNING (1976), the Goodyear Blimp-blowing-up-the-Super Bowl BLACK SUNDAY (1977), and the mad-bomber-terrorizing-amusement-parks ROLLERCOASTER (1977), disaster films showcased then-state-of-the-art special effects depicting catastrophes both natural and man-made, and a large cast of stars both current and from Hollywood's golden age. The incredible success of these films spawned countless imitations, from exclamatory made-for-TV disaster movies like HEAT WAVE! (1974), FLOOD! (1976), and FIRE! (1977) to drive-in exploitation like THE BEES (1978) and AVALANCHE (1978) to the inevitable foreign-made ripoffs with films like TIDAL WAVE (1975), which inserted new footage of Lorne Greene into a Japanese disaster movie; the Italian oil fire thriller OIL (1977); the Canadian city-on-fire thriller CITY ON FIRE (1979); and the Italian/Brazilian co-production KILLER FISH (1979), which involved an emerald heist, a laughable tornado, and a river filled with hungry piranha. It's unfortunate that most of these films lacked the hyperbolic punctuation that the TV movies used--think how much better KILLER FISH would be if it was called KILLER FISH!
In addition to the mandatory "faces in boxes" poster design, disaster movies frequently featured supporting roles for an off-season or retired sports star, usually from the NFL, such as Rosey Grier in SKYJACKED (1972), O.J. Simpson in THE TOWERING INFERNO, Alex Karras in WHEN TIME RAN OUT (1980), and then-Houston Oilers quarterback Dan Pastorini in the aforementioned KILLER FISH, as well as college football star Mark Harmon in BEYOND THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE (1979). Other such stunt casting included the likes of fake evangelist-turned-actor Marjoe Gortner in EARTHQUAKE (1974), singer Helen Reddy in AIRPORT 1975 (1974), and game-show host and frequent TONIGHT SHOW guest host John Davidson--the Ryan Seacrest of the 1970s--in THE CONCORDE: AIRPORT '79 (1979). Audiences grew tired of the increasingly silly and often shoddy spectacles (how can we forget 1978's THE SWARM or 1979's METEOR?) and the demand for these things vanished. Kinji Fukasaku's mega-budget Japanese epic VIRUS (1980), featuring such stars as Glenn Ford, George Kennedy, Henry Silva, Sonny Chiba, and Robert Vaughn, was perhaps the most ambitious disaster film of them all, but couldn't find a US distributor even with a sappy Janis Ian theme song, and was cut by nearly an hour and drastically re-edited before going straight-to-video in 1984 (Fukasaku's complete 155-minute version is a masterpiece). By the time so-called "Master of Disaster" Irwin Allen, the man behind THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE, THE TOWERING INFERNO, and THE SWARM, unveiled the volcano epic WHEN TIME RAN OUT, the title could've applied to the genre itself, especially when it was expertly parodied that same year by AIRPLANE!, from the gathering of stoical, serious actors known for their stern gravitas (Peter Graves, Leslie Nielsen, Robert Stack), right down to the casting of NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar as himself, moonlighting as a pilot named "Roger Murdock." Disaster movies, at least in their 1970s incarnation, were done.
These films always had eclectic casts populated by actors you'd never expect to find working together (THE CONCORDE: AIRPORT '79 managed to get Alain Delon, Charo, Jimmie Walker, and Sylvia Kristel in the same movie), but the British/Italian/West German co-production THE CASSANDRA CROSSING provides a bizarre mix of international A-list, Hollywood old guard, Eurocult regulars, and one vacationing football star nearing the end of his playing days. It's not often you see people like O.J. Simpson and Martin Sheen mixing it up with the likes of THE LIVING DEAD AT MANCHESTER MORGUE's Ray Lovelock and FISTS IN THE POCKET's Lou Castel. Like many of its genre brethren, THE CASSANDRA CROSSING offers multiple problems for its heroes to conquer and is actually two disaster movies in one: first a terrorist exposed to a deadly plague stows away on a Geneva-to-Stockholm train, then the US military tries to contain the disease by intentionally diverting the train to an unsafe bridge in the hopes that it will collapse, killing all the passengers and making for a nice, convenient cover-up. There's a level of cynicism in THE CASSANDRA CROSSING that doesn't exist in other disaster movies. The US government is the villain here, and it's interesting that it's represented by Burt Lancaster, who starred in the same year's TWILIGHT'S LAST GLEAMING, a bile-soaked screed of a conspiracy thriller that depicted the US President's own cabinet members sending the newly-elected and earnestly naïve Commander-in-Chief (Charles Durning) to his own execution when he decides to go public with his predecessors' classified memos that will expose the truth about America's Vietnam policies. He's advised against it by those in his inner circle, old men who tell him "This is just how it's always been," and he pays the price for breaking tradition.
In CASSANDRA, Lancaster's Col. Mackenzie is dispatched to the World Health Organization headquarters in Geneva after three Swedish terrorists (Castel, Stefano Patrizi, and Carlo De Mejo) infiltrate the building and the resulting shootout ends up exposing them to a strain of pneumonic plague that's been developed--illegally and in secret--by the US government and stored in a lab on the premises. De Mejo is killed by a guard, Patrizi is wounded and captured, and Castel escapes. Mackenzie, his aid Major Stack (John Phillip Law), and WHO-based Dr. Stradner (Ingrid Thulin) get no information out of Patrizi before he dies, and Mackenzie orders the body burned. Castel, the lead terrorist, makes his way to a nearby train station and sneaks aboard the express going to Stockholm. It's here where CASSANDRA, for a while at least plays out as your standard issue '70s disaster epic. The major players onboard are renowned neurosurgeon Dr. Jonathan Chamberlain (Richard Harris); his romance novelist ex-wife Jennifer (Sophia Loren); requisite elderly con man Herman Kaplan (Lee Strasberg); hippie lovebirds Tom (Lovelock) and Susan (Ann Turkel); a grandmother (Alida Valli) and her granddaughter Katerina (Fausta Avelli); wealthy Nicole Dressler (Ava Gardner, also in EARTHQUAKE and CITY ON FIRE), wife of a German arms magnate, along with her heroin-addicted, drug-dealing boy-toy Robby Navarro (Sheen); and Haley (Simpson), an incognito-as-a-priest Interpol agent tailing Navarro. The script by Tom Mankiewicz, Robert Katz, and director George P. Cosmatos (who would go on to Hollywood blockbusters like 1985's RAMBO: FIRST BLOOD PART II and 1993's TOMBSTONE) spends a little too much time on the soapier elements of Jonathan and Jennifer's inevitable rekindling of their romance (they've already been divorced twice), but once the terrorist makes his way through the train, quickly infecting many of the passengers, things pick up considerably.
Oddly, the plague part of the film is resolved rather quickly. Chamberlain, in conference with Dr. Stradner, concludes that in a highly-oxygenated environment like a train, the disease will eventually run its course and people will recover unless, like the terrorist, it was directly absorbed into the bloodstream. The terrorist eventually dies, but those onboard who are afflicted soon find themselves on the mend. That's not good enough for Mackenzie, who orders the train to be diverted to a quarantined area--a former concentration camp--that will require it to cross a condemned bridge that hasn't been used since WWII. Of course, his intention--his orders--are to bury this incident by any means necessary, as the US was illegally developing deadly germ warfare in Geneva and keeping it secret. Mackenzie has the train met in Nuremberg by a team of 40 Army officers in HazMat suits led by Col. Scott (Tom Hunter). Scott's job is to keep everyone onboard and kill anyone who tries to get off the train. So, about midway through the film, with the plague story wrapped up, the action now centers on Chamberlain leading a passenger revolt against Scott and his goons and stop the train before it reaches the Cassandra Crossing.
Make no mistake, the bulk of THE CASSANDRA CROSSING is, like most of its disaster contemporaries, silly and illogical. Many of the actors on the train don't seem to be on the same page as far as what kind of movie they're in: Harris, Sheen, and Simpson play it straight and serious (as seriously as O.J. dressed as a priest can be taken), while Gardner, perhaps still amused by being cast as Lorne Greene's daughter in EARTHQUAKE, is glib and snarky at all the wrong times. Loren doesn't really have much to do other than look glamorous in soft focus, which Cosmatos ensures since her husband Carlo Ponti was the producer (Loren's introduction, where she's given numerous close-ups from various angles, is a bit excessive and obviously done to please Ponti). Strasberg's con man character keeps trying to sell phony watches, while you could make a drinking game out of how many times Valli helplessly says "Katerina!" to no one in particular after she gets separated from the little girl. And my God, I haven't even gotten to the song.
Any self-respecting '70s disaster movie had the mandatory maudlin theme song, like "The Morning After" from THE POSEIDON ADVENTURE and "We May Never Love Like This Again" from THE TOWERING INFERNO. Both of those songs were sung by Maureen McGovern and both won Oscars for Best Original Song. THE CASSANDRA CROSSING gives us a fine Ennio Morricone-esque score by Jerry Goldsmith, but also offered co-star Turkel--who was married to Harris at the time--singing something called "I'm Still on My Way," and she sings it early in the film, as she and Lovelock and some other hippie pals are jamming in one of the train cars. And just when you think it can't get any sillier, train conductor Max (Lionel Stander) takes a break from his duties to just hang out with them. It seems unnecessary to mention that their efforts were not rewarded with a Best Original Song Oscar. It's easily the worst scene in the film, and one that completely stops it cold and one that I never knew existed until I saw it on Turner Classic Movies some years back. For decades, I only knew the version that aired on NBC and in syndication, which mercifully cut that scene out entirely. Also absent from the television version are some gory bits from the finale, as the train indeed crashes and a good chunk of the passengers die horribly violent deaths: watch for the train rail cutting through a car and impaling a passenger right through his gut, yet another example of this film's unrepentant mean streak.
THE CASSANDRA CROSSING isn't the best of its type, but it's maintained a well-deserved cult-following over the decades, primarily for its unusual international cast and because it works very well as an entertaining thriller. But if you approach it from the angle of Lancaster's Mackenzie, there's some unexpected depth to the film. Of course, an old pro like Lancaster knows just how to play the various subtleties and nuances, and perhaps there wasn't anything in the script and he simply took it upon himself as an experienced actor to make something out of nothing. At the conclusion of the film, after telling Dr. Stradner "I know you see me as some kind of monster," and essentially saying he did what he had to do, you can see the sadness in Lancaster's eyes and it's the first moment in the film that Mackenzie seems remotely human. And in that moment, Lancaster makes us see that, like Stack and Scott and those under him, he's just a part of the machine. Lancaster nails it when he's about to leave the building. Stack offers to take him to a nearby bar and buy him a drink. Mackenzie says nothing, putting on his coat and unconsciously reaching for his uniform service cap, stopping himself, and going for his fedora instead. It's not that he isn't worthy of wearing it. No, he was a good soldier who followed orders. He's just too sickened by those orders to wear it, and by rejecting it, he retains some semblance of humanity. And as Mackenzie leaves the room without saying a word and heads down a long hallway to the exit, Stack can be heard on the phone with an unknown superior: "He's leaving right now. Yes, he and the doctor are both under surveillance." Mackenzie is as expendable as the people killed in the bridge collapse and he likely isn't making it to his next destination. In that closing scene, using no dialogue, Lancaster's aging face perfectly illustrates a career military man who served his country only to be made a fall guy who knows shit rolls downhill and it's coming straight for him. In that respect, THE CASSANDRA CROSSING--or, more accurately, Lancaster's sequences in it--makes for a fascinating companion piece to TWILIGHT'S LAST GLEAMING, where he played another soldier who just followed orders issued down a corrupt chain of command until his conscience could no longer allow it.
