Truly Dreadful Film

The Worst Film Ever

Beautiful, moving film.

Absolutely Fantastic

Based on the real-life war exploits of American soldier Al Schmid, the 1945 Warner Brothers picture "Pride of the Marines" tells a very moving story of bravery and personal triumph. The film was a huge box office hit back when, and for good reason. In it, the great John Garfield plays Schmid, and the actor had spent a good deal of time with the wounded warrior in his preparations before filming began. The result: Garfield turns in a performance here that is an Oscar-worthy one.The film cleaves pretty evenly into four discrete sections. In the first, we see Schmid in his hometown of Philadelphia, rooming with a young married couple, Jim and Ella May Merchant (played, respectively, by John Ridgeley, Eddie Mars from "The Big Sleep," and Ann Doran, the child psychiatrist from "Them!"), and their young daughter, Loretta. Ella May is constantly trying to play matchmaker for Schmid, and one day has her friend Ruth Hartley come by for dinner. Al and Ruth do not exactly "meet cute" in this film; as a matter of fact, their first date is marked by bickering, wrangling, insults and general nastiness. But somehow, the two DO manage to take to each other, as Al begins to wear the beautiful young woman down. And as played by Eleanor Parker, 23 years old here, Ruth certainly is a beauty indeed. All seems to be going well until a radio broadcast announces the bombing of Pearl Harbor, a news flash that does not bother the Merchant household overly much; indeed, none of them even seem to know where Pearl Harbor is! But Al wastes little time in signing up for the Marines, shipping off just after he and Ruth declare their love for one another. "I bet it would be more fun shooting Japs than bear," Al declares before he leaves, and brother, does he ever get a chance to do so!In the film's second section, we see Al's harrowing experiences at Guadalcanal in 1942. He and two others, NYC Jew Lee Diamond (another convincing "everyman" portrayal by the great character actor Dane Clark) and Johnny Rivers (Anthony Caruso; Bela Oxmyx from the classic "Star Trek" episode "A Piece of the Action"), bravely defend their machine gun nest against hundreds of advancing Japanese, but Rivers is killed in the battle, Diamond is severely wounded, and Al...well, he seems to be doing well, killing no fewer than 200 (!) of the enemy, until a grenade that is exploded very close to his position results in his near-total blindness. In the third section, an understandably bitter and depressed Al is shown in the veterans hospital in San Diego, where he is assisted by a kindly rehab officer, Virginia Pfeiffer (Rosemary De Camp, from William Castle's "13 Ghosts"). Al decides to call it quits with Ruth, not wanting to be a burden on her. Finally, in the last section, Al returns home to Philly to be awarded the Navy Cross, and Ruth and the Merchants make a desperate attempt to make the despondent war vet feel loved and wanted."Pride of the Marines" was expertly helmed by director Delmer Daves, who had earlier worked on the WW2 film "Destination Tokyo" and would go on to direct such classics as "Dark Passage" (one of this viewer's personal faves), "Broken Arrow" and "3:10 to Yuma." He elicits wonderful performances from all his players and incorporates some startling elements into his film as well. He makes the jungle-fighting sequence truly nerve wracking and does a fine job with Schmid's surrealistic dream sequence (utilizing negative images). The film contains any number of very fine scenes, besides that trippy dream segment and the Guadalcanal carnage. In one, the wounded vets in San Diego talk about their fears of returning to civilian life and their doubts about ever landing a decent job, beating "The Best Years of Our Lives" to the punch by a good 15 months. In another, Ruth desperately tries to convince Al of her devotion, lying next to him beside a fallen Christmas tree. And then there is the final scene, in which Al receives his Navy Cross while Ruth watches; a very moving segment, indeed. But if there is any particular element of the film that most contributes to its success, it would have to be the exceptionally fine performances of both Garfield and Parker. Garfield had just starred with Parker the year before in "Between Two Worlds," and in the next four years would appear in a string of classic films, including "The Postman Always Rings Twice," "Humoresque," "Body and Soul," "Gentleman's Agreement," "Force of Evil" and "We Were Strangers"; a truly remarkable streak. As for Eleanor, I had never watched her in a '40s film before (I believe 1950's "Caged" was the furthest back I'd ever seen this terrific actress), and was very happy to discover that she was both remarkably beautiful here ("Yeah, that's a nice face," Virginia declares of her photograph, and for me, that face would only grow more beautiful as Parker advanced into the 1950s) and more than capable of holding her own in dramatic scenes with the dynamic Garfield. Parker had only been a screen actress for three years at this point, but her talent is simply undeniable here; anyone could tell that this young actress would be "going places" soon enough....

As I watched, midway into 'Pride of the Marines' about these wounded soldiers back from Guadalcanal, I found myself embarrassed by this film and the bunch of "swell" wounded Marines discussing the difficult times that would be facing them as wounded veterans in their communities and in finding jobs when, in the background, another group of wounded soldiers break out in song:"In the evening by the moonlight When the darkies work was over We would gather round the fire Till the whole cake it was doneIn the evening by the moonlight You could hear those darkies singing In the evening by the moonlight You could hear the banjos ringin'"It certainly did remind me who we weren't fighting for. And, considering those lyrics, I was surprised that I wasn't able to find any reference to, or explanation of, that particular scene in any of the film's criticism.

John Garfield plays a Marine who is blinded by a grenade while fighting on Guadalcanal and who has to learn to live with his disability. He has all the stereotypical notions about blindness, and is sure he'll be a burden to everyone. The hospital staff and his fellow wounded Marines can't get through to him. Neither can his girl back home played by Eleanor Parker. He's stubborn and blinded by his own fears, self pity, and prejudices. It's a complex role that Garfield carries off memorably in a great performance that keeps one watching in spite of the ever present syrupy melodrama. The best scenes are on Guadalcanal, where he's in a machine gun nest trying to fend off the advancing Japanese soldiers in a hellish looking night time battle, and later a dream sequence in the hospital where he sees himself walking down a train platform with a white cane, dark glasses, and holding out a tin cup, all the while his girlfriend walks backward away from the camera.

This former Leatherneck appreciates more and more through the years John Garfield's gut-wrenching performance in the docu-drama PRIDE OF THE MARINES (1945), the true story of war hero Al Schmid who was blinded in combat on Guadalcanal by a Jap grenade. The picture, released a year before BEST YEARS OF OUR LIVES, was the first movie to deal in depth with the problems faced by returning vets. Scripted by Albert Maltz, who would eventually be jailed as one of the Hollywood 10, the film would catch major flack from Red-baiters at decade's end because of its politically-charged dialogue in one scene set in a veterans hospital, during which embittered soldiers forcefully voice both their hopes in and suspicions of a post-war society.The three layers of plotline dramatize an accurate microcosm of American life during a pivotal time period. PRIDE explores in its pre-war first part Garfield's lower-class, working-man roots as only he could portray urban struggles and dreams during the Great Depression. The harrowing middle portion, claustrophobically confined to a cramped and stinking Pacific island foxhole (shared with Dane Clark and Anthony Caruso to form a 3-man machine gun team), graphically captures the fears and horrors of war as few films have.But it is this citizen/soldier's readjustment in the final sequences, aided by compassionate nurse Rosemary deCamp and home-town fiancee Eleanor Parker (in a performance worthy of a Supporting Oscar nomination) that really packs an emotional wallop. Doubting his self-worth, lost in a sightless world (his post-operative cry of "Why don't God strike me dead!" is chilling), and struggling to comprehend the difference between love and pity, Garfield's perfectly modulated performance combines all the elements of his unique persona (rebellious icon, tough guy, romantic leading man, idealistic spokesman).Given his devotion throughout the war years to the Hollywood Canteen that he and Bette Davis created, the story must have been very close to his heart. This may be his finest screen role in a career filled with meaningful performances.