Monday, August 1, 2011

1951 - THE STEEL HELMET, interesting 50's look at the Korean War


Sam Fuller's take on the infantry soldier and the Korean War, has lots of supposedly tough realistic military stuff going on but it mostly is stuck in the obligatory rah rah we are here fighting to stop the spread of godless communism. 


Fuller worked on a very low budget and short production schedule supposedly shooting about 10 days.  The cast was mostly unknown actors who actually looked like soldiers. 


The platoon of American G.I.'s is the usual cross section of the country, one guy is black, another a conscious objector still another is a veteran of the D-Day landing etc.  They capture a North Korean soldier who attempts to spread dissension in the platoon but whatever else these dog faces might be they are still patriotic Americans. 


As usual the attraction with any Sam Fuller film is his blunt in your face style of film making.  The dialog and situations were a little tougher than the usual war movie cliches.  Audiences hadn't seen these kind of characters before, The Steel Helmet was a big hit. 

85 minutes.

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