Dick Powell, the likable crooner from the Busby Berkeley musicals of the 1930s surprised a lot of people when he toughened up his image in a series of excellent film noirs in the mid-40s and early 50s, including MURDER, MY SWEET (1944) and CORNERED (1945). In the 50s, he changed track once again by stepping behind the camera to helm five unassuming genre films: a good noir-ish thriller, SPLIT SECOND (1953), the infamous John Wayne turkey, THE CONQUEROR (1956), an innocuous remake of the Frank Capra classic, IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT (1934) entitled YOU CAN'T RUN AWAY FROM IT (1956) and two Robert Mitchum war movies, THE HUNTERS (1958) and, best of all, THE ENEMY BELOW.
While I'm usually wary of war films set inside a submarine (mostly because the incessant surfeit of technical jargon gets on my nerves pretty quickly), I can't deny that I've sat through some pretty good ones through the years, like CRASH DIVE (1943), DESTINATION TOKYO (1943), WE DIVE AT DAWN (1943), HELL AND HIGH WATER (1954), RUN SILENT, RUN DEEP (1958), TORPEDO RUN (1958), ON THE BEACH (1959), ICE STATION ZEBRA (1968), DAS BOOT (1981) and THE HUNT FOR RED October (1990). Now I can safely add another one to that not unimpressive list: THE ENEMY BELOW.
Robert Mitchum and Curd Jurgens are suitably sturdy as the two sea captains on opposite sides of this exciting cat-and-mouse WWII chase story. The climax of the film (featuring the bulk of the special effects which won an Academy Award) is an intensely suspenseful and nail-biting one, capably sustained by the director and the cast (including David Hedison and Theodore Bikel as each ship's respective second-in-command).
While I'm usually wary of war films set inside a submarine (mostly because the incessant surfeit of technical jargon gets on my nerves pretty quickly), I can't deny that I've sat through some pretty good ones through the years, like CRASH DIVE (1943), DESTINATION TOKYO (1943), WE DIVE AT DAWN (1943), HELL AND HIGH WATER (1954), RUN SILENT, RUN DEEP (1958), TORPEDO RUN (1958), ON THE BEACH (1959), ICE STATION ZEBRA (1968), DAS BOOT (1981) and THE HUNT FOR RED October (1990). Now I can safely add another one to that not unimpressive list: THE ENEMY BELOW.
Robert Mitchum and Curd Jurgens are suitably sturdy as the two sea captains on opposite sides of this exciting cat-and-mouse WWII chase story. The climax of the film (featuring the bulk of the special effects which won an Academy Award) is an intensely suspenseful and nail-biting one, capably sustained by the director and the cast (including David Hedison and Theodore Bikel as each ship's respective second-in-command).