Saigon (1948)

Wow! What a bizarre film! Unfortunately the few funny moments there were were quite overshadowed by it's completely weird and random vibe throughout.

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

The story-telling is good with flashbacks.The film is both funny and heartbreaking. You smile in a scene and get a soulcrushing revelation in the next.

The storyline feels a little thin and moth-eaten in parts but this sequel is plenty of fun.

Copyright 12 March 1948 by Paramount Pictures. New York release at the Paramount: 31 March 1948. U.S. release: 12 March 1948. U.K. release: 9 February 1948. Sydney release at the Prince Edward (for 4 weeks): 26 March 1948. Australian release: 22 April 1948. 8,493 feet. 94 minutes.SYNOPSIS: Air Force buddy has only two months to live, so Major Alan Ladd takes on a dubious charter flight to earn the money to show him a good time.COMMENT: This final teaming of Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake is a bit disappointing. Many of the ingredients for an exciting film are here, but the script forces Ladd to constantly take a back place in romance to Douglas Dick. Ladd has too little to do. And when the climactic action is handed over to Wally Cassell, one wonders if the producers are not trying to torpedo our hero's career. (A great stunt fall at the climax - but it's not Ladd that's made to look good).Nevertheless, the film is beautifully mounted. Seitz's photography is most attractive, sets and costumes are dazzling. Fenton's direction is immaculately smooth. No expense has been spared on crowds and atmosphere.Despite his often-relegated position on the sidelines, Ladd plays with his usual gruff vigor. Miss Lake is appropriately viperish as a vamp with both eyes on a fortune. Mr Dick is amiably weak as the buddy with too much platinum in his head. The main support players - Luther Adler as a cat-and-mouse detective, Mikhail Rasumny clerking a rundown hotel, Morris Carnovsky as a silken villain, and Eugene Borden as a philosophical if exasperated captain/engineer/steward - are one and all excellent, though Mr Cassell is perhaps just a little too bright and breezy in his stereotyped role of a girl-loving sergeant.OTHER VIEWS: Exciting thriller, played against exotic backgrounds - all brilliantly created in the studio, with convincing miniatures and almost imperceptible process screen effects. The art directors have excelled themselves here. Both sets and players are lovingly photographed by ace cameraman John F. Seitz. Director Fenton has drawn capable performances from his cast, kept the plot moving briskly and staged his action sequences with thrilling realism and drama. In all, splendid entertainment, impeccably (and expensively) produced. - J.H.R. writing as George Addison.

This movie does prove that Alan Ladd looks great in a tuxedo and would have made a great James Bond. Veronica Lake plays a secretary without a sense of humor until the last 1/3 of the film where she suddenly starts to look more like her usual sexy, peekaboo self. Only the last 1/3 of the film takes place in Saigon. The first hour is just the characters trying to get to Saigon. Weirdly, almost all the last 1/2 hour takes place in a hotel where their appears to be no Vietnamese. The movie could have been called Santa Cruz or San Diego, or any city name with as much relevance to the plot. The movie is surprisingly lacking in wit and suspense, at least until the last 20 minutes where things pick up a bit. I think the movie is just for Alan Ladd fans. The quote "This happened because it had to happen" is the best line in the movie, which tells you how bad the movie is.

Alan Ladd and Veronica Lake co-starred for Paramount in three classic films, This Gun For Hire, The Glass Key, and The Blue Dahlia. Their fourth and final film was Saigon and it doesn't rate in the category of the other three.Saigon has Ladd as a recently discharged Army Air Corps pilot who has not headed back to the USA, but hung around the Orient watching out for a buddy Douglas Dick who has had multiple surgeries due to head wounds. Dick has a platinum cranium courtesy of the war and the Army Medical Corps, but he's dying, he has maybe a month or two left.Ladd and another of his crew Wally Cassell are hanging around to make Dick's life or what's left of it, happy. For that reason they accept a flying job to Saigon, no questions asked from Morris Carnovsky who is carrying a lot of cash from shady wartime dealings and Veronica Lake. They're getting $10,000.00 for the flight.Lake and the cash get away all right, but Carnovsky is detained by the police who are firing at Ladd's plane as it is taking off. With them thinking Carnovsky is dead, the four are at liberty. Dick falls hard for the sexy Lake and Ladd wants to keep her around to make him happy in his last days. What a pal.All these elements come together in a bloody climax that I will not reveal. The idea of a story about a dying soldier was handled far better the following year by Warner Brothers in The Hasty Heart. This was also the second Alan Ladd film with a far east city title, the other being Calcutta from the year before. Although this film is better than Calcutta, it's still cut from the same routine action/adventure mold that Calcutta was taken from. And like Calcutta you would never know the problems that were happening in French IndoChina as the Viet Minh were starting their guerrilla war for independence against the French Colonial occupying power. Said power here is represented by Luther Adler who as always is giving a great performance.Veronica Lake left Paramount the following year and Alan Ladd would follow a few years after that. Too bad their screen partnership ended on a mediocre note.

Saigon is the end of the line for Mike Perry (Douglas Dick). As a Captain in W.W.-II, Perry had taken a wound to the head, enduring 6 months of varied and complicated surgeries. And, as a crowning glory, earning a plate of platinum to match the medals on his chest. Despite the efforts of the best doctors, he is fading fast; only he doesn't know it. Rather than telling him and sending him home to die, Mike Perry's pals, Maj. Larry Briggs (Alan Ladd) and Sgt. Pete Rocco (Wally Cassell) decide to keep him on the move with them, as they travel the Far East. To cram "100 years of good living" into 2 months...maybe less. (For the rest, the only similarities with THE BLUE DAHLIA are 3 army-pals (Jimmy, George and Buzz), and 1 pal with a W.W.-II head-wound (Buzz).)However, good living comes at a price: Larry Briggs and both boys take a flying job, offered them by the unscrupulous Alex Maris (Morris Carnovsky), and for a payment suspiciously high $10,000 suggests something more akin to smuggling rubies, than to an innocent business trip as Mr. Maris calls it. But then again, that kind of money could set thing up nicely for Mike Perry.Shady deals often involve shady ladies. Just as the arranged flight is supposed to take off, Mr. Maris' secretary Susan Cleaver (Veronica Lake) appears on the scene, dressed in a leopard coat. Her demeanor is anything but sweet, a quality enhanced, when anyone reaches for the briefcase she carries; but something about her captures Mike's attentions… and Larry's. The attraction might have been a passing fancy, if Susan Cleaver didn't now find her lot thrown in with the boys', when the sound of gunfire triggers an emergency take off. Amidst much protest, Susan is bundled in, up, and off to Saigon (nowadays called "Ho Chi Minh City", Vietnam).Veronica Lake and Alan Ladd amaze me with their sensitive portrayals, they give so much! Susan Cleaver and Larry Briggs are characters with a past, melancholy, but not devoid of all feeling, of all hope. In one scene, Larry Briggs points to a mark on Susan Cleaver's face, where she had been slapped. "Is this where he hit you?" Larry asks, leaning over to kiss the spot. "There, now it doesn't hurt anymore." Susan shows indifference, almost loathing… until he leaves the room. Then she turns slightly, resting her head against the bedpost….she's falling for him... There's another marvelous sequence involving an evening gown (made by Edith Head). Susan comes out of her hotel room, finding Larry on the adjoining balcony. Susan is resplendent in draped white. Larry walks up to her; Susan turns around to give him the full view, her usually straight face softened into a sweet expression. Gingerly, Larry takes the back collar of her gown, which is actually a hood, and frames Susan's beautiful face. Larry looks at her for a moment, and then with the same gentleness, lets it back down. "No. It looks better the other way, with your hair showing."...I like "Saigon" very much. Performances are really excellent all the way around. Tender scenes are played with sincerity, as are the lighter moments that lend relief to this melodrama. Unconcerned with strict adherence to plot, it delves instead into character study, and is the better for it. It gives us the why, when and where, and leaves us to discover the how. The suspense and adventure are wonderful...the romance too!I really look forward to the moment, when this great movie will be released on DVD; NTSC-VHS copies of this film are scarce nowadays. My proposal: a Veronica Lake DVD-box with Veronica's other scarce films, like "The Blue Dahlia", "The Glass Key", "I Wanted Wings" and "So Proudly We Hail!"Robert