Highway Dragnet, The Hi-Jackers, The Hill, and a few more movies

My pledge to you:
Only the basics of a movie's premise,
with no spoilers after that.

High Treason (1929; Britain)
Streaming free at Internet Archive
Streaming free at YouTube (silent)

Set in the distant future of 1940, this is the first sci-fi talkie. It's about a looming war between the Federation of Europe and the Atlantic States, with arms manufacturers and big business trying to manipulate events toward war, and a radical woman heading the World League of Peace, trying to prevent the war.

Being a sci-fi guy, an old movie buff, and a peacenik pinko commie, I wanted to like High Treason, but the warranty has expired and it no longer works as intended.

#333  [archive]
SEPT. 9, 2024

The story sways between silly and sincere and a soap opera, and it's sunk by the stilted theatrical over-acting of the male lead. The special effects are sometimes interesting, even impressive for 1929, though of course, never believable for a moment in 2024.

It was also released as a silent film, with a slightly different plot, and both versions are substantially shorter than IMDB's promised hour and 35 minutes. I can only review what I've seen, though, not what isn't there.

Verdict: MAYBE. 

♦ ♦ ♦       

High Wall (1947)
Streaming free at Internet Archive

Here's a convoluted story with an unlikable protagonist who insists he's innocent of killing his wife.

Sure, he was furious at her, and he wanted to kill her, and he tried to kill her, but he was only beginning to strangle her when he blacked out, so some other perp must have finished the strangling.

Yes, seriously, that's the set-up.

Can't remember a mystery where I cared less whodunit.

And watch out for the story's wildly unConstitutional conclusion.

Verdict: NO.

♦ ♦ ♦      

Highway Dragnet (1954)
Streaming free at Internet Archive

After High Wall (above), this is refreshing. It's good, basic storytelling, a thriller that's small on budget but big on gumption.

Richard Conte plays a Marine who's mustered out, and is vacationing in Vegas. He picks up a floozy, and they have a fine time (off-camera, of course), but when she turns up dead he's the prime suspect.

Did he kill her? Maybe he did, maybe he didn't. He doesn't waste any words denying it, but he's not willing to wait around while the cops gather the evidence necessary to fry him, so he hightails it out of town, and soon bums a ride with two women.

The story was co-written by legendary cheapskate Roger Corman, who also produced. It's a steady potboiler, though, and a dang fine time in (a backlot dressed up like) the Nevada desert.

Trivia: the movie's highest-ranking cop seems to be native — his name is White Eagle — but nobody says anything about it. He's just a cop, that's all. Which is pretty progressive for 1954.

Verdict: YES.

♦ ♦ ♦     

The Hi-Jackers (1963; Britain)
Streaming free at YouTube

With swinging '60s music, this is a cool heist and heist again flick, about a gang of truck thieves.

What they do is, stage a phony wreck on a back-country road, then wait until a truck comes along. The truck driver sees the wreckage, and hops out to be helpful, which gets him beaned and tied up, and if all goes according to plan then they've stolen another truck — and the load it's carrying.

The latest driver to be victimized had picked up a pretty hitchhiker, and neither of them were hurt in the hijacking, but she got a look at the top baddie... so he sends two men to help her forget.

The dialogue is smart, the storytelling crisp, and everybody's a little more complicated than ordinary movie characters. It's a cheap movie, but British, so it's classy as caviar compared to any 1960s American flick that might've tried telling a similar story.

Verdict: YES.

♦ ♦ ♦      

The Hill (1965; Britain)
Streaming free at Internet Archive

In the military, following orders is more important than anything, more important than being human, and anyone who doesn't follow orders must be punished. The Hill is about the punishment.

It's set at a ghastly military prison camp, where the inmates include Sean Connery and Ossie Davis. With a few other men, they share the same barracks, which is more accurately a cell. They're perpetually drilled by sadistic officers in what amounts to a life sentence of boot camp, including an artificially constructed hill which figures into their daily torture. The men are ordered to climb the hill, rush down it, climb it again, and to taunt any fellow prisoners who collapse.

Welcome to military hell, where even watching the movie is an exhausting, depressing experience. It's a refresher course on why I hate military movies, and the military, but it's a good film.

Might be worth showing it to any boy who's considering a career in the armed services. Then again, I thought the same of Platoon, so I took my nephew, and a year later he joined the Army.

Verdict: YES.

♦ ♦ ♦       

Hindenburg Disaster Newsreel Footage (1937; France)
Streaming free at YouTube 

From Pathe, this is a five-minute newsreel that played in theaters shortly after the Hindenburg went down in flames. It's narrated too pompously and faux poetically, and doesn't include the famous line, "Oh, the humanity!" but you can't top the visuals. Great special effects! 

Here's something I've never understood, and it isn't explained here:

Science hadn't bottled helium yet, so they used hydrogen to lift airships off the earth, but of course, hydrogen is flamboyantly flammable. It'll go up in a flash with even a spark — and everyone knew it.

So why would anyone say yes to the idea, and manufacture zeppelins, and run regularly-scheduled zeppelin service with a fleet of miniature hydrogen bombs, ready to go boom if someone so much as lights a cigarette? How did they get financial backing, and insurance for such a folly-filled plan? Why were passengers willing to pay? Have humans always been such dolts?

Verdict: YES. 

♦ ♦ ♦

• James Earl Jones, actor whose voice could menace or melt, dies at 93 

• Remembering Famous Monsters of Filmland 

• Turksploitation — films without intellectual property 

• Beverly Washburn interview: Spider Baby, Star Trek and more

  9/9/2024   

• • • Coming attractions • • •     

Hippy Porn (1991)
Hiroshima, Mon Amour (1959)
His Girl Friday (1940)
His Kind of Woman (1951)
A History of Violence (2005)
    ... plus schlock, shorts, and surprises

— — —

Now accepting movie recommendations,
especially starting with the letter 'I'.
Just add a comment, below.
— — —

Illustration by Jeff Meyer. Click any image to enlarge. Arguments & recommendations are welcome, but no talking once the lights dim, and only real butter on the popcorn, not that fake yellow stuff. 

 

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