Force of Arms (1951)

one of my absolute favorites!

I don't have all the words right now but this film is a work of art.

As Good As It Gets

It's funny, it's tense, it features two great performances from two actors and the director expertly creates a web of odd tension where you actually don't know what is happening for the majority of the run time.

As a combat veteran, I can tell you that this movie is one hundred percent authentic. The action is certainly more realistic than modern day movies like Saving Private Ryan, which was full of gimmicks. In Force of Arms, nothing much is happening most of the time, then all hell breaks loose and your pals mostly die. You do not see the enemy most of the time and when you do, they appear for a split second as a target. It seems that the closer a film is to the actual events, the more realistic it is. This film was made only 7 years after the event. Saving Private Ryan was made some 60 years after WW2, which is too big a gap. The acting by Nancy Olsen and William Holden is superb. The film also depicts Clark's triumphal entry into Rome. Clark was probably the best general of WW2. He brilliantly bypassed the places where the Germans were anticipating an attack and bravely went straight through to save Rome. He was given the title of American Caesar.

A year after they joined Gloria Swanson with Oscar nominations for the memorable "Sunset Boulevard," Bill Holden and Nancy Olson were passionate in "A Girl for Joe," which was also known as "A Force of Arms." No matter what the title, the film was certainly a major disappointment.The writing is weak here. Holden is the Lieutenant in the Army who meets fellow Lieutenant Olson, on a cemetery hill in Italy, where she is grieving for a lost love. Within moments, love blossoms between the both.The film alternates between battle scenes and days off for enjoyment for the GI's. We soon find ourselves with a wedding and Olson in a family way, only to have Holden, who is distraught with the deaths of his friend and a superior, go missing. We then find Olson frantically looking for him. Remember Little Boy Lost? Substitute a grown man for the child.

Just caught it on Turner. The reviews calling it "routine" show how dull-normal some people are. In fact, the old pro Michael Curtiz (look him up) brings an extraordinary sensibility to the film. Gone are his romantic stylings of Casablanca and Robin Hood, his lush, overdone Warner's agreeable foolishness. Instead, he portrays war as bitter and without glory, full of random death and meaningless violence. The three combat sequences are superb, and Holden, as he would later demonstrate in "Bridge on the River K" is brilliant as a reluctant soldier who has no sense of glory and no wish to be a hero, but is nevertheless the everyman Infantryman, who knows he must do his duty. Curtiz doesn't turn this evocation of battle into boy's fantasy; it's hard, bitter, terrifying and brutally unfair to children and especially young American men who never thought they'd be dying in the slopes of Mt. Casino. The romance is nicely done, even if the ending is trite (but, in the way that cheap melody can be, amazingly satisfying). Olsen and Holden have great chem (as they proved in three other films as well) and all in all, the whole piece is kept in a register of near-realism that's very affecting. A neglected minor gem from the great Curtiz.

It's hard to say if FORCE OF ARMS is a romantic love story with a war background or if it is a war film with a romantic background! Either way it comes across as an enjoyable 100 minute motion picture. Very loosely based on Hemingway's WW1 epic romance "A Farewell To Arms" it was produced by Anthony Veiller for Warner Bros. in 1951 and the usual workmanlike direction came from the legendary Michael Curtiz.Beautifully photographed by genius cinematographer Ted McCord in glorious black & white and from a splendid screenplay by Orin Jannings it starred William Holden as a battle weary, hard bitten GI who during the German occupation of Italy in 1943 and the Battle Of San Pietro falls in love with a reluctant WAC (Nancy Olson).Holden delivers one of his very best performances but he's left really to carry the movie almost on his own. This is a fault with the picture! He is surrounded by what is essentially a cast of minor players! Third billed is Frank Lovejoy who is as unimpressive as ever! Then we have what are called the supporting players (in this case Holden's GI buddies) such as the bland Gene Evens (who seemed to be in everything during this period), the irritating Dick Wesson (trying as usual to be humorous and not being very successful) and Paul Picerni who never did anything worthwhile with his career. But for me the most disappointing piece of casting is that of the pivotal female lead! Although she won an Oscar nomination for her performance in Billy Wilder's brilliant "Sunset Boulevard" I always found Nancy Olson to be an unremarkable actress and most wanting in the looks/glamour department. She always gave me the impression of looking more like a favourite aunt rather than a lover or even a leading lady! However, she must have held some fascination for Holden as she was his leading lady in three other films - "Sunset Boulevard"(1950), "Union Station" (1950) and "Submarine Command"(1951). Who knows - perhaps she was HIS aunt too! HUH?Besides Holden's winning performance, a literate screenplay, the atmospheric art direction (the Italian mock-ups are splendidly realised) there is also a wonderful score by the great Max Steiner. For the battle sequences he brings into play some military cues he wrote for other Warner war pictures he scored such as "Sergeant York" (1941). But the main central theme is an inspired and memorable bit of writing! First heard under the titles it is at once a sumptuous sweeping melody that is hauntingly used in the love scenes making them both meaningful and heartfelt.FORCE OF ARMS despite some iffy aspects is an enjoyable enough drama set in wartime with Holden as always making it watchable. A few years after its initial release in 1951 it was reissued with the unfortunate and unforgivable title "A Girl For Joe"!