This movie was standard fare on L.A. area TV when I was growing up and I once saw it with my dad who was a professional soldier and Korean War veteran. The unit depicted in this movie is the 24th Infantry Division, the same unit that my dad was a member of in the early days of the war. During the battle for Taejon the 24th Infantry Division lost over 4500 soldiers killed or missing in 3 days of fighting and my dad was lucky to get out alive. My dad was very quiet when we saw this movie and I have never had the nerve since to ask him what he thought about it. In my personal opinion as a professional soldier and combat veteran, as far as movies about the Korean War go, this one is as good as it gets. There are others such as "Porkchop Hill", "Fixed Bayonets" or "One Minute to Zero" that I would recommend, but none accurately depicts the desperation of the early days of the war when American soldiers were outnumbered and overwhelmed. This gritty war drama follows an infantry platoon with a vague mission to seize a hill, led by a platoon leader who is determined to follow those orders.In this movie, soldiers die horrible deaths, on both sides. A black soldier (James Edwards) left behind to cover the rear of the column is strangled by North Korean infiltrators. Three North Koreans disguised as Americans are mercilessly gunned down. When two of his soldiers are killed in a mortar barrage, the platoon sergeant (Nehemiah Persoff) loses it and cries, "they got them!" and runs toward them to be killed himself. A North Korean POW is gunned down by his comrades when he appeals to them to surrender. Death takes lives at every turn when you least expect it and the tension takes its toll. The incidents depicted in this movie really happen in war. Does anyone ever wonder why soldiers in combat are edgy and always in a bad mood? The soldiers are exhausted by lack of sleep, weary of danger, out of contact with higher headquarters and understrength for the mission they are assigned. This tension brings out conflicts between the men. Between MSG "Montana" (Aldo Ray) and the lieutenant (Robert Ryan), between the soldiers themselves and they ruthlessly take it out on the enemy.In a memorable performance, actor Robert Keith plays "the Colonel", a regimental commander who has a mental breakdown after the loss of so many of his soldiers. His portrayal is based on real incidents that happened early in the war when seasoned commanders, some who were WWII veterans, broke down when faced with the overwhelming loss of soldiers during the fighting. Darwinism plays a role in war by winnowing out the weak and incompetent. Throughout the whole movie the shell shocked Colonel has no dialogue until the very end. In the middle of the battle the "Colonel" regains his senses and competently joins his beloved soldiers in their last fight to the death. As he is dying he utters a single word to his faithful sergeant (Aldo Ray), calling him "son".These are not Hollywood dramatics. My wartime commander once told me that he saw me as his "son" until he got me home safe to my real dad. War creates a "brotherhood" between men that cannot be described to those who have never been there and this movie brings those relationships out.There are also leadership lessons to be learned in this movie. When the platoon leader expresses doubt to his radio operator (Philip Pine) that anyone else is alive in Korea, his radioman says he knows it, but to hear it from a commander he trusts shakes his faith. As a combat leader, you do not say anything that creates or confirms doubts in your soldiers. You lead the way despite your doubts or misgivings and inspire them to follow. There are too many other scenes to mention that are memorable. Vic Morrow plays a soldier who can barely hold it together emotionally, especially after Edward's character is brutally killed. Philip Pine plays a conscientious NCO whose faith in his platoon leader is unshakable.If anyone thinks this is war movie melodrama, then you've never seen real combat. America has forgotten what it is like to suffer mass numbers of casualties like we suffered during Korea or Vietnam. And just like before the Korean War when we thought "push button" warfare had replaced close infantry combat, we are in for a rude shock if we ever go to war against a determined and well equipped enemy like the North Koreans. This movie is a reminder of that.As in the lyrics of the closing theme, my dad remembers men he knew - LTC Otho Winstead, Chaplain Herman G. Felhoelter, MSG Robert Morrison, PFC Jaime Corona, MSG Leonard Talley and many others who did not come home - and to this day, I know that my dad still grieves for those friends he lost in that war fought so long ago.

Korea, 1950. Robert Ryan is a lieutenant in command of what's left of his platoon, a dozen or so men. They are alone, surrounded, and unable to communicate with their division, so they face a dreary trudge of many miles in the most promising direction. They're shortly joined by a jeep carrying a stunned and insensible major (Keith) and his gruff, hostile sergeant (Ray). Ray is built like a Panzer and his neck is a very short telephone pole. His head is so large that his helmet doesn't sit on it, it encases his skull like a watch cap. All the men are scared, weary, or sick, except Ray. He exercises his combat skills until Ryan finally accepts him and his catatonic major into the group -- not that Ray gives a damn one way or the other.The enemy are treacherous and, worse, they're real SNEAKY. They camouflage themselves with bushes and branches. "They move like cats!", exclaims one sergeant (Persoff).The movie isn't too inventive or realistic, on the whole. James Edwards, while bringing up the rear, learns that you should never sit down, decorate your helmet with flowers, and take off your shoes while you're alone. Every soldier in a war movie knows that you can't relax, even for a moment, when the enemy are around. (They should never climb a tree either.) We've seen it before. There's little in the way of believability either. When Ray and his major first arrive, Ray has his Thompson sub-machine gun pointed at Ryan's chest as he disobeys one order after another. When Ryan finally relieves him of the gun, Ray pulls a knife and prepares to attack the officer. Yet a few minutes later, Ryan returns the gun to Ray. Would you do that? The story, for all it danger and suspense, doesn't seem to have been well thought out. The platoon drags itself along from one dangerous incident to another with little clear direction of what their goal is. Bayonets are always fixed. They must survive an ambush and snipers, run through an artillery barrage, step gingerly through a mine field, take a hill occupied by the enemy. Bonds are formed but remain unexplained. Why did James Edwards insist on taking care of the frightened Vic Morrow? Nobody else cares. And what is the nature of Aldo Ray's utter devotion to "my colonel"? Why would two frightened soldiers manning a light machine gun, shout, "Let's get outta here!", and then run up the hill toward the enemy, firing their rifles? I may be too hard on the film. It doesn't insult the audience. I don't mean to suggest that it's putrid, just routine. I'm sure the production was hampered by a low budget. The dusty hills and gum trees are in Los Angeles, not Korea. We never see more than a handful of men. At the end, when the cavalry comes too late, the single man on guard comes tumbling down the slope to announce their arrival -- but we don't see them. No acting is called for but the men we observe do professional jobs.Good for a watch, but probably not a second.

By good luck, I came across a VHS video (good print) of this 1950s Anthony Mann film. It was well worth watching. It is stark, unflinching, and offers an altogether convincing depiction of how soldiers behave in a harrowing, no-win situation. Robert Ryan and Aldo Ray, both truly fine actors, are excellent in their symbolically contrasting roles of two kinds of military men. Robert Keith and Vic Morrow are standouts in supporting roles. Keith is especially wonderful in an essentially non-speaking,though key, part...his face says it all. The music by Elmer Bernstein and the cinematography by the great Ernest Haller are perfect...the soundtrack creepy and other-worldly, and the cinematography capturing the "no man's land," confusing, deadly landscape in longshots, as well as the emotions of the soldiers when photographed close-up. See this film!

'Men in War (1957)' had been sitting on my video shelf for quite a few months, but I was very interested in watching it. Anthony Mann, generally known for directing Westerns, here avoids the conventions of his favoured genre, and a brief glimpse of the opening scene had promised a stark, realistic war-time drama, unconcerned with patriotic gallantry and instead focused on the psychological torment of being exposed to continuous conflict. My expectations were, for the most part, excellently met. In a wonderful year that included stunning war pictures from Stanley Kubrick, David Lean and Mikhail Kalatozov, 'Men in War' manages to hold its own, despite what was likely a comparatively low production budget. Part of the film's merit lies in its focus on characters. There are, in fact, two "wars" at play in the film: between the American platoon and their faceless Asian enemies, and between feuding soldiers Lt. Benson (Robert Ryan) and Sgt. Montana (Aldo Ray), who must construct a tentative alliance if they are to emerge intact from enemy territory.In 1957, Stanley Kubrick released 'Paths of Glory (1957)' which featured perhaps the most spectacularly realistic scenes of warfare until 'Saving Private Ryan (1997).' Mann's film, produced in the same year, strives for a more modest brand of realism, one less concerned with fireworks than with isolation punctuated by the unexpected threat of danger. In most WWI and WWII pictures, the major battles are played out amid gunshots and canon-fire, exploding earth and dying soldiers. The Korean War (1950-1953) presented American soldiers with a new kind of conflict: guerrilla warfare. Lt. Benson leads his platoon through enemy territory in an improvised retreat, and, at times, it even seems as though the men are engaged in a peaceful forest hike – the unbroken silence is not unnerving, as it probably should be, but deceptively reassuring. One soldier (James Edwards, the pioneering African-American actor from 'The Set-Up (1949)') even appears to forget his circumstances entirely, lulling himself into a false sense of security that is sharply and inevitably encroached by a silent enemy ambush.Robert Ryan is ideally cast in the leading role, bringing to the character his characteristic intensity, world-weariness and self-doubt. Though undoubtedly a dedicated leader, Lt. Benson finds even his own resolve cracking under the pressure of seclusion and imminent, unseen peril. Even more interesting, however, is Aldo Ray as Sgt. Montana, who would be a selfish, dishonourable scumbag if it weren't for his unwavering devotion to a shell-shocked colonel (Robert Keith), and his meticulous knowledge of enemy tactics. The remaining soldiers, including Vic Morrow and L.Q. Jones, are unfortunately relatively anonymous characters, and their eventual dispatching is mostly without emotion – or perhaps by then we've simply become so hardened to the prospect of death that we can't feel anything. Though the obligatory heroic ending strays onto the beaten track, I was mostly impressed with how 'Men in War' generally avoided clear-cut heroics. The soldiers killed by enemy attacks are betrayed by unlucky circumstances or momentary lapses of judgement; even the final assault on an enemy stronghold seems almost pathetically inadequate.