FIVE GRAVES TO CAIRO Movie Review

1943 Billy Wilder

Billy Wilder's suspense film is one of the great forgotten sleepers of World War II. He and writer-producer Charles Brackett bring out the best in each other. If this melodrama lacks the substance of The Lost Weekend or Sunset Boulevard, it is every bit as entertaining. The script is solidly built, with elements of suspense deftly laid in along with pungent acerbic humor. The casting is flawless and the actors make even the more preposterous moments seem credible.

After a foreword that establishes the setting—June 1942, with the British 8th Army in retreat toward Cairo after the fall of Tobruk—the film opens with an indelible image. A tank grinds slowly across an expanse of white dunes; a dead man lolls in the open hatch. Inside are more bodies. The only survivor is Cpl. John J. Bramble (Franchot Tone). Without giving away too much of the delicious plot, eventually he finds himself at the Empress of Britain Hotel, run by Farid (Akim Tamiroff), where Mouche (Anne Baxter) is the maid. The advancing Germans commandeer the place. The swaggering advance man, Lt. Schwegler (Peter Van Eyck), takes over with a terse warning: “Our complaints are brief. We make them against the nearest wall.” He wants things to go smoothly for his boss, Field Marshall Erwin Rommel (Erich von Stroheim), who arrives with the key to the entire North African campaign hidden in his map case. The other two main players are Gen. Sebastiano (Fortunio Bonanova), an Italian who's not too careful with his pistol, and Paul Davoss, a dead waiter.

The rest of the story is built on hidden identities, shifting loyalties, and a hasty patchwork of extemporaneous lies. In other hands, it could have been nothing more than a featherweight mystery that exploits the war. Though the filmmakers are not above propagandistic jabs, they know that the audience shares their anti-Nazi sentiments and so those need not be hammered home. Rommel is an intriguing character, a man who can be a convivial host to a captured foe one moment, an arrogant swine the next. Though von Stroheim's work is broader, almost burlesque when compared to the similar character he played in Grand Illusion, it is exactly what the film calls for. Franchot Tone is every bit as good. He brings a cerebral, selfeffacing quality to his work. Perhaps because of that, he has never found the following among later generations that some his contemporaries like Humphrey Bogart and James Cagney enjoy.

In the end, the film maintains a careful balance of elements with humor, suspense, and anti-fascist politics complementing each other and arriving at a conclusion that strikes the right note of seriousness. Perhaps the film's belated arrival on video (in 1997) accounts for its relative obscurity. Whatever the reason, it is a genuine treat for any war movie fan who has missed it.

Cast: Franchot Tone (Cpl. John J. Bramble), Anne Baxter (Mouche), Erich von Stroheim (Field Marshall Rommel), Akim Tamiroff (Farid), Peter Van Eyck (Lt. Schwegler), Fortunio Bonanova (Gen. Sabastiano), Miles Mander (Col. Fitzhume), Konstantin Shayne (Maj. Von Buelow), Leslie Denison (British Captain), Ian Keith (Capt. St. Bride), Frederick Giermann (German Sergeant), Fred Nurney (Maj. Lamprecht); Written by: Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett; Cinematography by: John Seitz; Music by: Miklos Rozsa. Producer: Charles Brackett; released by Paramount Pictures. Awards: Nominations: Academy Awards ‘43: Best Black and White Cinematography, Best Film Editing. Running Time: 97 minutes. Format: VHS, Closed Caption.