Incannerax What a waste of my time!!!

Greenes Please don't spend money on this.

ReaderKenka Let's be realistic.

Bluebell Alcock Ok... Let's be honest. It cannot be the best movie but is quite enjoyable. The movie has the potential to develop a great plot for future movies

Robert J. Maxwell Interesting story of underwater demolition teams exploring the landing beaches around Okinawa in World War II. The cast has some well-known names too, though some were just getting started. Don't blink or you miss Robert Wagner and Jack Warden.If the story of their work is engaging -- and it is -- the group dynamics aren't, nor does anything in the dialog particularly sparkle. Richard Widmark takes over a UDT team after the death of the commander they idolized. He does things by the book. He's resented by the crew who continually compare him to their previous leader and who believe he's an inept and unfeeling poltroon.Widmark is understandably unhappy and broods a bit. Standing against him in the crew are the chief, Dana Andrews, and the usual motley cast of World War II movies -- the Brooklyn wise guy, the family man. The combat scenes are handled well enough. SCUBA gear was still a novelty at the time. The production had the cooperation of the U. S. Navy, and why not? It's basically a promotional film. The large ship on which the team is berthed in an APD, a fast transport. Proper protocol is usually followed. When a man receives an order on the radio, he doesn't say, "Roger. Over and out." He says the correct, "Wilco, out." There are some exceptions though. Two or three times, Widmark shouts to the coxswain, "Full speed ahead!" That belongs in a comic book. At least nobody wears caps indoors or salutes without them, as they do in the far more lavishly funded "Crimson Tide." By the end, of course, after a final dangerous mission and the tense disarming of a dud torpedo, in both of which enterprises Widmark plays an important part, the team comes together as a group.The plot is lifted from "Twelve O'Clock High," also a Twentieth-Century Fox Production, and the dialog is by the notorious Oscar Millard. He was the guy responsible for the speeches in John Wayne's classic "The Conqueror." There, Wayne had to say things like, "She is much wummin." And, "Yew're beautiful in yewr wrath." I saw "The Frogmen" as a kid and all of us kids were excited by it. The frogmen rolling one by one off the speeding landing craft into a tethered rubber raft and then over the side with a great white splash of impact. It was all new to us, as it was to the rest of the audience. Some of us tried playing "Frogman" in Lake Hopatcong but it's hard to roll off a speeding boat when the boat is a ten-foot-long rowboat moving at the pace of an unskilled swimmer doing the breast stroke. I didn't enjoy it quite so much this time around, but then I don't enjoy ANYTHING quite as much these days.

MARIO GAUCI As would be the case with DESTINATION GOBI (1953), which I’ve just watched, this unusual war film about a specialized outfit also happens to be a starring vehicle for Richard Widmark (and, similarly, featured no prominent female roles). Fox were noted for the documentary-style approach to their films for the first few years of the post-war era; this was a typical example, mixing realistic detail (while the underwater photography in itself is well done, the film tends to drag during these sequences) with a number of established Hollywood conventions.Widmark begins by rubbing his men the wrong way because of their devotion to his predecessor, with Dana Andrews as his chief antagonist (especially after the former opts to leave the latter behind during a reconnaissance operation). At one point, however, Andrews has to take over a mission when Widmark becomes indisposed (where the former’s lack of responsibility leads to serious injuries sustained by one of the men); eventually, the two acquire a mutual respect – which occurs when a torpedo fired at the ship by the enemy fails to explode and has to be delicately dismantled.The latter sequence is one of four suspense/action set-pieces in the film: the others being the two underwater missions themselves and the trial run for the first operation mentioned above. The supporting cast is led by Gary Merrill (acting as, more or less, the voice of conscience) and Jeffrey Hunter (as a brash young member of the team); also appearing, in unbilled roles, are subsequent favorite character actors James Gregory and Jack Warden.

davida-mccarley My dad used to tell us stories about the film every time it came on - he was in UDT Platoon 2 on TDY from Korea and got to spend part of his rotation for R&R doing the film with his team. They did all the underwater work, the scenes with the landing craft picking up the team from the water, and they set the satchel charges for the shot when they blow up the beach obstacles prior to the landing.He also used to to tell stories about Dana Andrews and his drinking during the filming, but that is another story. It is a good movie and, from Dad's and the UDT's perspective, had some BS in it - but relatively accurate overall.In Korea, his team was assigned to swim in from off-shore and go inland to blow up installations, bridges, etc. overrun by the North Koreans/Chinese. They had to swim their stuff in from miles offshore, hump the explosives inland (armed with a knife and a pistol - Dad said he used a .38 because he couldn't hit much of anything over 30 yards away with a .45), blow up the objective then make it back out. Of course, things were even MORE primitive for the combat swimmers of WWII!

yarborough I didn't expect too much from this movie as I watched it for the first time, but it was even more minor than I originally thought. Widmark is a bland star for this one, as is Dana Andrews, but young Jeffrey Hunter does a decent job. However, the characters on the ship (which is the setting for the whole movie) are simply too immature and childish to be believable as navy men. Also, the story is simply not interesting (though it has a few intriguing moments) and the climax is sleepy and trite. On top of that, the underwater sequences are not impressive. But the biggest disgrace in this movie is the publicity stunt that was pulled for Robert Wagner. In the opening credits of this movie Wagner is billed fifth, with his name in huge letters, but he appears literally in no more than five seconds of the movie, has no lines, and can only be seen at a distance. Apparently, when this movie was made, he was nothing, but by the time it was released, he attained some popularity, so the company pulled a fast one on the young girls who hoped to see him in this movie. Years ago I noticed that a similar stunt was pulled for Wagner for the 1950 film "Halls of Montezuma" but to a lesser extent.