gordonl56 FIXED BAYONETS – 1951 This is not an antiseptic flag waving propaganda war film. It is a brutal, hard hitting piece about fear, and courage, among men who know they could die at any moment. Director Sam Fuller pulls no punches in this Korean War film from 1951.The US, UN and South Korean forces had pushed the North Korean Army back almost to the border with China. They were then caught off guard when Chinese Red Army forces attacked them. This soon forced a massive retreat along the whole front.This film is about a small group of American soldiers left behind to man a rear guard post. They need to make the Chinese believe that they are facing a much larger unit. The US unit needs to delay the Chinese for 48 hours to allow their own troops a chance to fall back and regroup.They chose a narrow pass through the mountains to base their defence on. They mine the approaches and set up a series of machine gun posts. Whenever the Chinese probe the defences, the American hit back hard and heavy, keeping the Chinese guessing as to the US unit strength.This tactic can only work for so long, as there are only 50 or so soldiers. First the LT. in charge, Craig Hill, is killed, then, the two senior sergeants, Michael O'Shea and Gene Evans bite the bullet. Command of the survivors, falls to Richard Basehart. Basehart is a former officer candidate who has a fear of giving orders.Forced to step up and take charge, Basehart fights his personal demons and does just that. He holds the post for as long as he can, then leads the survivors back to meet with the rest of the division.Except for a couple of scenes, the whole production was filmed on a sound stage. This does not distract from the film at all, there are plenty of well-staged battle sequences etc throughout the film. The action is down and dirty, with all looking like they have been put through a wringer. This is a gritty, well-made war film.The director, Sam Fuller also scored big a little earlier with another Korean War film, THE STEEL HELMET. Both these are well worth a look for war film buffs.

jlpicard1701E Of all the war movies I have ever seen (some very good, some good, some less good and others, simply awful and preachy), this one, together with all his other "companions" (see "The Big Red One") is simply what one might expect, or better, should expect from a "war" movie. I put quotes around "war" because in reality, Fuller's movies of this genre are all but war movies. If you look deeper, you will see that they are actually anti-war movies at their best and absolutely not pontifying a message of peace, but rather depicting war and the men involved in it, as a total chaos, a slaughterhouse and a total misery for those who live it. Fuller's movies do not glorify war, but rather show the grittiness, the dirt, the shadows and the deepest darkness that surrounds and envelopes people who are in its midst. There are just a few others in his league, such as Peckinpah and John Irvin who managed to send the message home. Yet, sadly, there are still people "glorifying" war as a noble expression of human endeavor. Such people never understood a thing about war, or simply never served on active duty, in order to judge with their own eyes what war is really all about. Usually, such people sit comfortably behind a desk in a wonderfully padded armchair, or simply on a luscious couch, following Baseball or Football events and allow others to do their dirty work for them. "Fixed Bayonets!" is a crude, raw and unforgiving depiction of what common men are put through in a war situation. The Korean War might be just the excuse to do so, since every war, past, present and yes, even future, brings inexorably pain and death to those who fight it, as well as to those who wait back home, for a husband and father (today also a wife and mother), or for a brother, sister, son or daughter... Samuel Fuller's intention was always to bring reality into the game, but evidently, his message never got through to some, especially not to those hyper-thyroideal muscle men who believe that brawns alone will win you a war... In my book, this movie, together with all other Sam Fuller's work of this kind should a must see in schools everywhere. This would finally teach children what war is really like. But, said this, I just remember another movie, called "All quiet on the Western Front", in its two incarnations, one in 1930, and the other more recent, in 1979, which already dealt with the very same argument and what did those movies affect? Nothing. War is still among us. And so is the misery of our human condition. When will humanity listen to people like Fuller, Peckinpah, Irvin, Remarque and many others who lived through war and survived it? Oh sure, they are honored now... now that they are dead and cannot do too much harm to the war and death industry, but will there ever be someone who will actually manage to put the word "The End" to war? I seriously doubt it. In my view, this movie is simply a must for those who are seriously interested in studying war as a phenomenon, not just as a past time.

Michael O'Keefe Veteran filmmaker Samuel Fuller writes and directs this war drama about conscience and survival. It is kill or be killed. Richard Basehart plays Corporal Denno, who is intellectual and refined hiding his fear of assuming responsibility as he is part of platoon forming a rear guard against the enemy while the rest of the regiment retreats to regroup. Denno feels he is in a near-perilous situation as he watches three superiors get picked off one by one. Physically Denno is a good soldier; but mentally he fears taking command and being responsible for the men who serve under him.FIXED BAYONETS! was filmed and released during the Korean War Kudos to cinematographers, art directors and set designers for making a Fox Studio sound stage look like mountainous and snowy Korea. The cast also includes: Michael O'Shea, Gene Evans, Craig Hill, John Douchette, Henry Kulky and Glenn Corbett.

Robert J. Maxwell Sam Fuller, the director, could sometimes give interviews that were as interesting as his movies. No baloney, and his cynicism was up front and cheerful. He'd been a Chicago newspaperman, straight out of "The Front Page", and there is a photo of him leaning back in his chair, feet propped on the desk, a cigar in his mouth, his fedora tilted back with a "press" card in its band. A kind of caricature of a hard-boiled reporter, almost a cartoon.That, for some reason, is how many of his war films strike us today -- as cartoons rather than reality -- and "Fixed Bayonets" isn't an exception. I know the story is from a novel but it might as well have been a comic book with stereotyped soldiers uttering sentences short enough to fit into dialog balloons above their heads. Don't know why. Fuller was in the First Infantry Division during the war, the Big Red One, already in his mid-30s, and he never got over it. Years later, when the war was all over, when Fuller was safely back home, he could tell interviewers that he couldn't even listen to a noise like this (and here, he'd rap his knuckles lightly against a wooden surface) without leaping to his feet. The guy had been through hell. One of his fellow sufferers was nicknamed Griff, and there is a character named "Griff", sometimes unseen, in most of his movies."Fixed Bayonets" is the story of a platoon picked to provide a rear guard while the rest of the regiment retreats. Their mission is to engage any communists in pursuit and try to convince them that the entire regiment is present at this last ditch stand.The central figure is a lowly corporal (Richard Basehart) who is both brave and intelligent but who cannot bring himself to kill another man or to order someone else to do it. Three men are above him in the chain of command. You can guess what happens to them.There's nothing much to be said about the performances. The lines being so rudimentary, there is hardly any performance to be given. "I'll get you back alive, Sarge." "Hey! Watch it. That's an open wound!" Richard Basehart is at least believable as the unfortunate corporal. He's never been a bravura actor and that slight, stiff reticence is precisely what the part calls for. He seems to be thinking, and thinking doubtful thoughts, while he performs the requisite tasks.I don't mean to suggest that the film stinks in any way. Fuller may use stereotypes but he uses different stereotypes from the ones we expect. It's an in-your-face report of a handful of men doing a dangerous job requiring skill. No prattling on about why they're fighting. (The enemy are simply "gooks".) And nobody dreamily describes the main street in Basset, Nebraska. Nor does some illiterate from Brooklyn tell the story of the goil me met on the Steeplechase at Cony Island. They're all too busy and too scared for that. There are a lot of close ups too, of sweaty, smudged, bearded, determined faces. In a way, it's primitive movie-making, in the way that Grandma Moses is a primitive painter. The most memorable feature of the movie is its set-bound, snow-bound pseudo-location. There is no wind to speak of, and although everyone's feet are in danger of frostbite, nobody's breath steams in the supercold air. And yet the rugged, snowy set is claustrophobic and as effective in invoking an atmosphere as anything short of a "Lawrence of Arabia" epic. On a low budget, this is about the best you can do, and it's pretty good.