Sahara **** (1943, Humphrey Bogart, Bruce Bennett, Dan Duryea, Richard Nugent, Louis Mercier, Lloyd Bridges, Rex Ingram, J Carrol Naish) – Classic Movie Review 3197

Humphrey Bogart stars in director Zoltan Korda’s sterling 1943 wartime thriller Sahara as an American tank commander called Sergeant Joe Gunn in Libya during the Western Desert Campaign of World War Two.

Separated from their unit during a general retreat from German forces, Sergeant Gunn leads an assortment of desert war drop-outs through the perilous sands of the Sahara in the wake of the battle for Tobruk in 1942. His crew consist of Waco Hoyt and Jimmy Doyle (Bruce Bennett and Dan Duryea), British medical officer Captain Jason Halliday (Richard Nugent), and Free French soldier Corporal Leroux (Louis Mercier). The group comes across Sudanese Sergeant Major Tambul (Rex Ingram) and his Italian prisoner, Giuseppe (J Carrol Naish).

Director Zoltan Korda, producer Alexander Korda’s younger brother, delivers a vibrant classic wartime story of a group of racially and ideologically disparate individuals trying to beat the evil Nazi enemy to the only source of water. He also combines this with a vital attempt at capturing the perils of the desert in a realistic style that emphasises the absolute power of the elements.

Bogart plays the sergeant with great verve and conviction in what was the third of four movies he was to star in that year, the next being opposite the newcomer Lauren Bacall in To Have and To Have Not.

Praise can be made all round, but especially for the acting of the stars and the notable supporting cast, as well as for the powerful screenplay (by Zoltan Korda, John Howard Lawson and James O’Hanlon) outstanding cinematography by future director Rudolph Maté and score by Miklos Rozsa.

Also in the cast are Lloyd Bridges as Fred Clarkson, Patrick O’Moore as Ozzie Bates, Carl Harbord as Marty Williams, Guy Kingsford as Peter Stegman, Kurt Kreuger as Captain von Schletow, John Wengraf as Major Von Falken, Hans Schumm, Frank Lackteen and Frederick Worlock.

Sahara is based on a story by Philip MacDonald using an incident depicted in a 1936 Soviet film called The Thirteen by Mikhail Romm.

It was filmed on location in the Imperial County portion of the Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, near the Salton Sea, using soldiers and equipment of the US 4th Armored Division.

Sahara is directed by Zoltan Korda, runs 97 minutes, is released by Columbia, is written by John Howard Lawson, Zoltan Korda and James O’Hanlon, based on a story by Philip MacDonald, is shot in black and white by Rudolph Maté, is produced by Harry Joe Brown and is scored by Miklos Rozsa.

It was remade by André de Toth as a Western with Broderick Crawford called Last of the Comanches (1953) and by Brian Trenchard-Smith as the Australian film Sahara (1995).

© Derek Winnert 2015 Classic Movie Review 3197

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Humphrey Bogart in Sahara (1943).