Castle Keep (1969) is a very anti-heroic World War II film filled with lots of dark humor and beautiful photography. The film is based on William Eastlake’s novel about a weary squad of American soldiers who come upon a tenth century castle in Belgium in December 1944.

Sydney Pollack, who was still yet an unknown in Hollywood circles, was chosen to direct this large scale film. Veteran Hollywood great Burt Lancaster stars as Major Abraham Falconer, who leads a reconnaissance squad badly in need of R&R. The remaining cast includes Peter Falk (Sgt. Orlando Rossi), Patrick O’ Neal (Capt. Lionel Beckman), Scott Wilson (Cpl. Ralph Clearboy), Tony Bill (Lt. Amberjack), Al Freeman (Pfc. Alistar P. Benjamin), Michael Conrad (Sgt. De Vaca), and wide eyed screen great Bruce Dern (Lt. Billy Byron Bix).

In the opening scenes of the film, the men are trying to maneuver their battered jeep through heavy mud down an old road. The use of slow motion photography of two individuals on horseback establishes the meeting of the two residents of the castle and the American soldiers. The Count of Maldorais (Jean-Pierre Aumont) welcomes the American soldiers and hopes that they will help protect his castle and its vast treasures and art from the advancing Germans who are preparing to counter-attack in the Ardennes Forrest.

Once in the castle, Maj. Falconer (Lancaster) begins fortifying in preparation of the attacking Germans. His adjutant Capt. Beckman (O’Neal) is an art historian who stresses the importance of the Count’s art collection and that the castle holds some of the greatest treasures of Western Europe.

Beckman tries to convince the Major that they should pull back towards the Meuse River and spare the castle from any destruction. Falconer is a career soldier and cares nothing for the statues, paintings, tapestries, and other treasures. Falconer’s men quickly find ways to keep themselves entertained whether its using expensive bottles of wine as bowling pins, defacing bust sculptures, or satisfying certain requirements at the local whore house in the nearby village known as The Red Queen.

This week’s pick takes us to ‘Nam with Go Tell the Spartans (1978) which shows the first ever encounter among American forces and the Viet Cong before major American involvement in Vietnam took place. Director Ted Post adapts Daniel Ford’s book “Incident at Muc Wa” and turns it into one of the most brutally honest war films ever made.

In 1964, only a few hundred American personnel deemed as “military advisers” aided their South Vietnamese allies. These advisory commands were stationed in lone outposts in the countryside. Their mission: to observe and report enemy activity in their spheres of influence. Burt Lancaster stars as Major Asa Barker, a seasoned American officer who heads a small squad of American troops and a handful of Vietnamese rice paddy farmers turned militiamen.

Barker’s command is situated near the Cambodian border which was a major battle ground some years earlier during the French-Indo China War (1946-54). Barker is isolated in the jungle w/o any logistical support. Many of the weapons used in the film are old, outdated weapons like M1A1 sub-machine guns from World War II and Korea, and Springfield M1 Carbine rifles also leftover from America’s previous wars.

Zulu Dawn (1979) is the prequel to the 1964 film Zulu which tells the story of a proud British army which suffered the worst defeat ever inflicted by a native army during the Victorian era. Burt Lancaster (Colonel Anthony Durnford), Peter O’ Toole (Lord Frederick Chelmsford), Simon Ward (Lt. William Vereker), Bob Hoskins (Sgt-Major Willams), James Faulkner (Lt. Melvill and film’s producer), Denholm Elliot (Lt. Col. Henry Pulliene), and Sir John Mills (Sir Henry Bartle Frere) head the cast of British officers and bureaucrats which began the legendary Anglo-Zulu war.

The film is a rather well researched account of the battle at Isandlwana. This was in Zulu land which bordered the British colony of Natal in South Africa. In January, 1879. Sir Henry Bartle Frere (Mills) is the High Commissioner for her majesty Queen Victoria who along with Lord Chelmsford (O’ Toole), insight a war against King Cetshwayo, the King of the Zulu people who rules in ways that the British view as a threat to their colony and hegemony in the region.

After a British ultimatum to disband his army, Cetshwayo refuses to capitulate to the British and the war begins. Lord Chelmsford leads his army which consists of two battalions of the 24th regiment of foot, to cross the Buffalo River which divides the border of the Zulu territory. Believing that their technological superiority will aid them in victory, the British send 1350 troops against a Zulu army of 25,000.

When I grow up, I want to be Claudia Cardinale.

There are plenty of beautiful women in movies, but few goddesses. Cardinale is a goddess. Even when she’s sunburned and running around in a rag, as she is in The Professionals, she has more charisma, beauty, and sex appeal than most actresses working today. I hesitate to call her “sexy” because that word seems so Maxim Magazine these days — but Cardinale is sexy in such a powerful and womanly way that it’s not threatening, but inspiring.

She also had great hair. What demon do I have to bargain with to end up with a perfect bouffant every day? Hers looks good even in the desert. It’s unfair.

Watching old movies can be a bittersweet experience. They don’t make them like Cardinale anymore, and you’d be hard pressed to find a Lee Marvin or a Burt Lancaster on the big screen these days. I cherish retro crushes on both (especially Lancaster — what a grin he had!) and The Professionals is so chock full of old time machismo that turning it off may actually cause you to experience symptoms of withdrawal.

Which is, oddly, what The Professionals is kind of about.   It’s the kind of movie I love in any genre — the adventure story that’s sandwiched in between the heroes’ misspent youth and their retirement.   These are men with pasts.  They’ve had near misses, they’ve experienced terrible tragedies, and they’ve woken up in their union suits with nothing but a pounding headache to remind them of the night before.   They’re men who die with their boots on out of a sense of nobility and because they have nothing else to do.

Vera Cruz is a film that’s often name-dropped in the discussion of Great and Influential Westerns. Starring genre heavy-weight Gary Cooper and Burt Lancaster, every synopsis you’re likely to come across promises a film with adventure, a Mexican countess, and bromance. Don’t believe them.

Cruz is set in the midst of the Mexican Revolution of 1866, a time when mercenaries and adventurers crossed the border in search of profitable employment. In fact, it’s the very same setting as Two Mules for Sister Sara, and if fanfiction had existed in the good old days, someone would have written a sexy crossover. Thank goodness it didn’t.

The film wastes no time in setting up Ben Trane (Cooper) and Joe Erin (Lancaster) as that most reliable of Western archetypes — the broken down Confederate, and the daring mercenary. Their characters are rigidly defined within the first ten minutes over the matter of horseflesh. Trane shoots his injured horse because it’s suffering.