Beau Geste

Beau Geste is another classic adventure from Hollywood's golden year, 1939. Based on a P.C. Wren novel, it's the most iconic - and shamelessly romantic - film portrayal of the French Foreign Legion. It's not as brilliant as its same-year counterparts The Four Feathers or Gunga Din but it's enjoyable enough as featherweight escapism.

Three orphaned children - Beau Geste (Gary Cooper) and brothers Digby (Robert Preston) and John (Ray Milland) - live with foster mother Lady Brandon (Heather Thatcher), a generous British noblewoman spurned by her husband. Lady Brandon plans to sell a family jewel for money, but someone steals it and blame falls on the Gestes. The brothers flee to the French Foreign Legion, and are shipped to Algeria where they serve under the sadistic Sergeant Markoff (Brian Donlevy). The Gestes make plenty of friends, but run afoul of Markoff and his weaselly informant Rassinoff (J. Carroll Naish), who knows their secret. An attempted mutiny and attacks by marauding Tuaregs postpones the confrontation, but a reckoning with Markoff is inevitable.

Beau Geste is pitched at an adolescent level, playing like a precocious thirteen year old's fantasy. It portrays the Foreign Legion as a summer camp, with lots of cool guys and fun activities but a jackass counselor who tries to ruin everything. This fantasy is undeniably appealing; who wouldn't want to go off with your brothers and friends to an exotic country and fight Arabs? (Granted, that last part isn't so exciting these days.) The undying camraderie of the brothers drives the story forward, kids who never grow up and always stick together, and the movie earns its sentimentality by playing things absolutely straight.

Beau Geste is enjoyable but dramatically mixed, getting by on the barest minimum of plot. The story is extremely thin, and the rivalry between the Geste and Markoff isn't given proper room to breathe. The film plunges into a series of battles just as intersquad tensions come to a head, and the showdown with Markoff is almost an afterthought. The Tuaregs are just pop-up targets without discernable motivation beyond the need for action fodder.

Director William Wellman (Battleground) shows his usual flare for action scenes, and the battles are well-staged and exciting, keeping the movie entertaining even when the pace flags. The final reels go on a bit too long, but the final twist adds a clever layer to the story. Despite its faults, there's never a dull moment.

Gary Cooper is heroic in his usual noble, colorless fashion, with Ray Milland and Robert Preston following suit. The three heros are extremely likeable, but function as a unit and none of them really standout. The real standout is Brian Donlevy (Hangmen Also Die!), giving a deliciously hammy performance that dominates the film's second half. The interesting supporting cast includes a young Susan Hayward as a love interest, J. Carroll Naish (Rio Grande) as a snitch, Albert Dekker (The Wild Bunch) as a mutineer, and Broderick Crawford, Stanley Andrews (Mr. Smith Goes to Washington), James Stephenson (The Sea Hawk) and Henry Brandon (The Searchers) as various Legionnaires. A young Donald O'Connor (Singin' in the Rain) plays Beau as a child.

Beau Geste is a fun little adventure. If it runs a bit thin on story in the later sections, at least it never wears out its welcome or loses its charming tone.