The Cockleshell Heroes

The Cockleshell Heroes (1955) is typical of '50s British war movies. Drawing on a real-life incident, it provides more sober flag waving familiar from The Cruel Sea and Carve Her Name With Pride. Its main anomaly is that Jose Ferrer, noted Puerto Rican-American, both directs and stars!

Royal Marine Major Stringer (Jose Ferrer) organizes a raid on Nazi shipping in Bordeaux. He clashes with Captain Thompson (Trevor Howard), a veteran Marine who resents Stringer's rapid promotion and unorthodox methods. After a training exercise turns farce Stringer leans on Thompson, who whips the Marine recruits into shape. Eventually they're tough enough for the big mission, stiff upper lips and all.

A co-production between Irvin Allen and Albert "Cubby" Broccoli, The Cockleshell Heroes is a schematic experience. Like its peers it features cheeky Brit heroes pulling off an impossible mission - not only the adventurous Stringer but familiar faces Percy Herbert and Anthony Newley as grunts. The movie celebrates the extraordinary heroism of ordinary guys, keeping its drama relatively measured; pleasing escapism for Britons not entirely reconciled to the end of Empire. David Lean put this genre to bed with Bridge on the River Kwai; subsequent commando films featured de facto superheroes.

Ferrer's direction is competent enough, marked mainly by John Wilcox's beautiful Cinemascope photography. The Portuguese locations are stunning and the movie's big set pieces (a training exercise gone wrong, the climactic raid) provide requisite action and humor. John Addison's anthemic score is highlighted by Vivian Dunn's title march; Addison later incorporated it into his score for The Charge of the Light Brigade.

Ferrer isn't half-convincing as a Brit but handles his man-of-action role well-enough. Co-star Trevor Howard does the real heavy lifting: established as a by-the-book hardass, Howard gets the meatiest scenes elucidating his back story and helping an AWOL recruit get revenge on his wife's lover. From The Third Man on Howard was always left holding the bag for marquee names, a waste of a talented actor.

The Cockleshell Heroes is a respectable example of a bygone genre. Neither terribly complex nor innovative, it provides a dose of nostalgic entertainment.