The Black Tent ** (1956, Anthony Steel, Donald Sinden, André Morell, Anna Maria Sandri, Terence Sharkey) – Classic Movie Review 7322

Despite an intriguing premise, director Brian Desmond Hurst’s old-style 1956 British adventure yarn The Black Tent becomes a tedious, dated World War Two North Africa-set wartime action romance, remarkable mainly for André Morell’s energetic performance and Desmond Dickinson’s pretty Technicolor location cinematography. However, it is ambitious and notable as the first English-language film to be shot largely in Libya.

Bedouin Arabs in Tripoli (the capital and largest city of Libya) tend war-wounded British Eighth Army officer Captain David Holland (Anthony Steel), who falls for and weds Mabrouka (Anna Maria Sandri), the simple daughter of their sheikh, Salem (Morell). But Steel is betrayed to the Nazis and is killed. However, many years later his brother Charles (Donald Sinden) travels to Libya to search for his son Daoud (Terence Sharkey).

Hurst’s pace is slack, even in a short running time of 93 minutes, Robin Maugham and Bryan Forbes’s screenplay (from Maugham’s story) is creaky and unconvincing, and the central romance very toshy, with both Steel and Sandri exceedingly dull.

Some other compensations come in the support cast of Ralph Truman as Major Croft, Donald Pleasence as Ali, Anthony Bushell as Ambassador Baring, Michael Craig as Sheik Faris, Anton Diffring as Senior German Officer, Frederick Jaeger as Koch, Paul Homer as Khalil ben Yussef, Derek Sydney as Interpreter and Terence Sharkey.

Italian Sandri’s English had to be dubbed by Nanette Newman, wife of screenwriter Forbes, who also had an acting role as a dying enemy soldier that took three days to shoot, but he was cut out of the release print.

It was released by Rank  in a double bill in the US with Checkpoint (1956).

Terence Sharkey (born 1938) has written about his experiences of the filming in Love, Life and Moving Pictures: Rites of Passage for a Young Actor in 1950s London.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7322

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