Ten Seconds to Hell ** (1959, Jack Palance, Jeff Chandler, Martine Carol) – Classic Movie Review 7489

Director Robert Aldrich keeps the tension reasonably high in his 1959 thriller Ten Seconds to Hell, despite a contrived, none too credible plot device, the unattractive characters, poor German accents and the insipid romantic interludes. The plot has six German ex-soldiers hired to defuse unexploded Allied bombs in the ruins of Berlin after the Second World War, particularly British 1000 lb bombs.

Jack Palance and Jeff Chandler star as Eric Koertner and Karl Wirtz, who are among the six defusing bombs in Berlin, and they and the rest of their bomb squad (Robert Cornthwaite as Franz Loeffler, Dave Willock as Peter Tillig, Wesley Addy as Wolfgang Sulke and Jimmy Goodwin as Hans Globke) all agree to pool half of their earnings so that whoever survives longest gets all the money. Obviously, it is an explosive situation, but even more explosive is the lads’ confrontation over sexpot Margot Hofer (Martine Carol).

With Palance and Chandler on typically good form, Ten Seconds to Hell is certainly tolerable and watchable, though it is not one of Aldrich’s very best. Although it is a mostly male movie, the poster advertises it on the main female character: ‘WATCH! THIS WOMAN WANT AND HUNGER FOR ONE OF THEM TO COME BACK!’

Oddly, though it seems very American, it is a Hammer Film Production, with the studio interiors filmed at the UFA Studios, in Berlin, Germany. Robert Aldrich and Teddi Sherman’s screenplay is based on the novel The Phoenix by Lawrence P Bachman. Curiously, Aldrich went on to make a movie called The Flight of the Phoenix.

Also in the cast are Richard Wattis, Virginia Baker, Nancy Lee, Jim Hutton and Charles Nolte.

Ten Seconds to Hell is directed by Robert Aldrich, runs 93 minutes, is made by Hammer Films and Seven Arts, is released by United Artists, is written by Robert Aldrich and Teddi Sherman, based on the novel The Phoenix by Lawrence P Bachman, is shot in black and white by Ernest Laszlo, is produced by Michael Carreras and Robert Aldrich, is scored by Kenneth V Jones and is designed by Ken Adam.

© Derek Winnert 2018 Classic Movie Review 7489

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