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In Roger Corman's low-budget combat film The Secret Invasion (1964), a
group of British criminals, each possessing a special skill, is pardoned in
order to be assigned to a dangerous, possibly suicidal mission during World War
II. That plot sounds familiar, of course, from two huge productions that this
movie preceded - The Dirty Dozen (1967) and Play Dirty (1968), the
latter perhaps the best of its type - but in truth the general story idea had
been around awhile. "Dirty group" combat movies, as film historian Jeanine
Basinger has labeled them, have their genesis in Gung Ho!, which came out
all the way back in 1943, smack in the middle of the real WWII. In that film,
the soldiers aren't specifically pardoned criminals, but they might as well be,
seeing as they're such an astonishingly ugly and bloodthirsty bunch of
characters. (They do, however, get their job done in most entertaining
fashion.)
The Secret Invasion is unique as a Roger Corman version of this story
trope. (He sandwiched the picture in between two of his Edgar Allan Poe
adaptations, both of which also came out in 1964: The Masque of the Red
Death and The Tomb of Ligeia.) Even though this was Corman's
biggest-budget production to date ($590,000), The Secret Invasion still
feels like a typical Corman movie, with a lurid atmosphere, "shock" cuts, and a
down 'n dirty, somewhat rushed feeling.
It does result in an odd mishmash, however, which ultimately doesn't add up to a
very successful movie. While it was filmed on location in Dubrovnik, Yugoslavia
(now Croatia), and along the Adriatic coastline (one of the most beautiful in
the world), large portions of the film are set in enclosed rooms or on the sea,
making it pretty startling to suddenly see the characters in a "big-budget"
location. It makes one wonder why Corman didn't devise his story to be filmed
more fully in those exterior settings.
Furthermore, the characters are generally lacking in big star power, furthering
the feel of this as a B film and not the A production that the locales would
indicate. Stewart Granger and Mickey Rooney are the biggest names in the cast,
though both were in career decline. Henry Silva, a "bad guy" character actor,
makes a strong impression as a silent killer, and Raf Vallone is most appealing
as a former organized-crime head. He comes off as something of an Italian Burt
Lancaster. Rooney is given little to say - a good thing, for he is meant to be
Irish and his accent is just terrible!
While there are a few exciting action sequences, The Secret Invasion
feels in the end like a series of vignettes which are not strung together by any
cohesive emotional coil. It lacks proper transitions between sequences, making
the cut to a new situation seem jarring in a disjointed rather than purposeful
way. Other times, the movie just doesn't make sense: when the group escapes from
a castle where they have been imprisoned, what starts as a handful of Nazis
chasing them suddenly turns into 20, then 50, then hundreds! Maybe Corman was
in a bit over his head with the scale of the production, but probably a better
script would have solved many of the problems.
Fans of TV's M*A*S*H will also recognize a powerful plot device involving
a crying baby - 19 years before it was used in the series' final
episode.
Fox Home Entertainment has put out a very good-looking anamorphic release of
this United Artists/MGM production. There are zero extras - just the movie. As
has become customary around Memorial Day each year, this is but one of many
male-oriented war films and westerns to be released from studio vaults. Some
other MGM titles (distributed by Fox) which fall into this category and are now
available include Man of the West (1958), Day of the Outlaw (1959)
and Morning Departure (1950).
For more information about The Secret Invasion, visit MGM Home Entertainment. To order
The Secret Invasion, go to
TCM Shopping.
by Jeremy Arnold
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