This week’s pick is another cinematic masterpiece from acclaimed director and combat veteran Samuel Fuller (Fixed Bayonets, The Steel Helmet). Merrill’s Marauders (1962) tells the story of Brig. General Frank Merrill and his American jungle fighters in Burma during World War II. What makes this film so unique from the bravado of similar war pictures that came out of Hollywood in the pre Vietnam early nineteen sixties was that it was based on actual events. The film stars Jeff Chandler (Brig. Gen. Frank Merrill), Ty Hardin (Lt. “Stock” Stockton), Claude Atkins (Sgt. Kolowicz), John Hoyt (General Joseph Stillwell), and Peter Brown (“Bullseye” a platoon sniper).
As World War II spread throughout the Pacific theater, there were intense campaigns in Asia from northern China, to the borders of British held India which the Japanese coveted for its natural resources, as well as adding it into their vastly expanding Asian empire. British Viceroy to India Lord Louis Mountbatten (uncle to Prince Charles), had devised many covert Anglo-American military units to harass and to thwart any attempt for an invasion of India by Japanese forces.
