TCM Pick O’ The Day: Saturday, March 14th
by John Nolte
3:15pm PST - Hell is for Heroes (1962) – A small U.S. squadron holds off the Nazis in a desperate last stand. Cast: Steve McQueen, Bobby Darin, Fess Parker, Harry Guardino Dir: Don Siegel BW-90 mins, TV-PG
No classic, but damn close and certainly a tough, engrossing WWII actioner, as though director Don Siegel teamed with Steve McQueen could come up with anything else. My favorite scenes involve a very young Bob Newhart putting the telephone bit that made him famous to good use as he fakes phone calls he knows the enemy is listening to in order to create the impression just a few guys, cut off and badly out-numbered, are something just a tad larger.
You look back on films like these and your memory recalls a rich, full, satisfying story. So it’s always surprising to see a run-time of 90 minutes, especially with so many bloated films today that eat up another forty minutes to tell half the story.
Steve McQueen. Yeah, we have some movie stars left, but he was the last of the gods.
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28 Comments
Ohhh Steve McQueen. Now that makes me smile. What a man. GROWR!
I think you'll be relieved to know that McQueen's legacy will live on through his grandson, who was just cast as the lead…in a vampire drama for the CW network.
I wish I were joking.
(Even though I, uh, actually watch a couple CW shows…)
Hey, McQueen started with "The Blob" so a vampire drama on the CW is not so bad.
I am old enough to have seen the movie when it first came out.Big McQueen fan and that was some eclectic cast.Bobby Darin wasn't bad.I have to go off subject and ask why Andrew would go on Maher's show.I think it adds legitimacy to the cretin.I understand getting the word out but I can't see it especially on his home court.Anyway,I wanted to get that off my chest.
I forget where I heard this story, but one of McQueen's earliest roles was a tough street punk(apt for McQueen) in a Paul Newman movie. McQueen thought very highly of himself but Newman wasn't impressed. This irked McQueen to no end, and he vowed to himself that one day he and Newman would be together in a movie and that McQueen would get first/top billing over Newman. They finally made The Towering Inferno together and there was a big fight over who would get first/top billing in the opening credits. Their names ended up side by side, with McQueen to the left(first), but with Newman raised a little higher(top) on the right.
I looked in IMDB and that could have been Somebody Up There Likes Me, the Rocky Graziano story. McQueen was uncredited in it.
Don't know about the full story, but McQueen was a street punk in Somebody Up There Likes Me — fer sher.
So Mr. Nolte, is watching "Hell is For Heroes" part of your birthday agenda for tomorrow? Whatever your plans, have a happy one.
Here is a very good story about Steve McQueen from the LA Times. The part about living in the airplane hanger was news to me.
Steve McQueen was an ex-Marine, a political conservative, pro Vietnam, carried a pistol (he learned he was on Charlie Manson's list), became (at this airfield) a born again Christian, and he mysteriously used to demand big lots of things like electric razors and bluejeans from movie studios when he was filming. It was revealed that he sent the lots of stuff to a boys home that he had lived in, he made visits to the home all of his life and answered every letter that the boys ever sent him.
http://articles.latimes.com/2008/nov/30/local/me-...
Happy birthday, John. One of these days, if there's any justice, it will be a national holiday.
Cheers, Burt
Burt, when you're Benevolent Dictator I will hold you to that.
Steve McQueen's last film, The Hunter, seems to have been quickly forgotten
(and it wasn't great, just modestly decent for entertainment) but he showed plenty of cool, likable charisma in it
(despite feeling poorly during the filming).
As for off-screen, he was a fascinating bundle of contradictions and inconsistencies,
like Ernest Hemingway (one of McQueen's heroes) and John Lennon (a McQueen pal).
I've read all the books on McQueen, and the best one by far (for my money) is the one by Christopher Sandford.
That's just a little different that today's leftard stars doing charitable work only for photo ops, isn't it?
Hell is for Heroes is a personal favorite. The War Lover is another by McQueen worth checking out. It's not exactly 12 O'clock High in technical terms, (the last time I watched it I think I saw strings holding up the B-17s).
I can remember as a kid looking forward every week to seeing McQueen on TV in "Wanted Dead or Alive." Although he was an early "method" actor, he (like Newman) dropped that nonsense very quickly. I was never a fan of James Dean and his method acting. Always looked like he was deciding whether to be a troubled teenager or a chest of drawers with two drawers open. McQueen, like Newman, was always perfect for his parts. At least McQueen didn't have to run around on a poster-board set searching for the Silver Chalice while Jack Palance chewed up the scenery. McQueen's name always seems to produce an automatic "Great Escape," but he did so many great parts.
In "The Great Escape" McQueen has very little dialog. Yet the DVD cover art has only his picture http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0057115/.
He had a way of letting us know what he was thinking without dialog.
McQueen fans never seem to talk about "Love With A Proper Stranger" but the look on his face when he finds out a girl he can't remember is pregnant with his baby is classic.
Steve McQueen? I am so there. The Brad Pitts and George Clooney metrosexuals of today can't hold a candle to him.
http://the100mostannoyingthings.blogspot.com/
Dennis, so true. THE GREAT ESCAPE is one of my all-time favorites. First time I watched it was with my dad and brother. I'll never forget it.
Another terrific little McQueen number, in case you all missed it, is Soldier in the Rain (with great turns by Jackie Gleason and Tuesday Weld (Directed by Ralph Nelson, based on a William Goldman book, Mancini music).
one more time Cincinnati
Papillon was probably my favorite McQueen movie. I was especially impressed during the solitary confinement sequence. All alone in a tiny room and it was never boring. That's an actor.
The War Lover is not as good as Hell is for Heroes (or 12 O´clock High, a true classic), but they definitely had a couple of real B-17s during filming. I´ll watch anything with WWII birds in it. And Shirley Ann Field is just as watchable.
My favorite scenes involve a very young Bob Newhart putting the telephone bit that made him famous to good use as he fakes phone calls he knows the enemy is listening to in order to create the impression just a few guys, cut off and badly out-numbered, are something just a tad larger.
That was a good scene, and watching Newhart on the phone was also quite funny. One scene with Newhart I always get a kick out of is when Bobby Darin tries to teach Newhart how to shoot a rifle and Newhart winds up almost killing Steve McQueen, who in turn, without changing his facial expression, turns his weapon 180 degrees away from the German lines and aims it right at Newhart.
It's Sat. 3/14 @ 8:15 p.m. just finished watch Hell is for Heroes, a second airing. You're right it is excellent. Total enjoyment on my part. Thanks for the tip. Question O-thority!
Terrific flick. Newhart answering field telephone: "World War Two…"
When the heck is "Soldier in the Rain" coming to dvd? I can't wait to see McQueen with Jackie Gleason.
The highest compliment I could pay Steve McQueen is that he was a real man.
Actually, the way I heard the tale was McQueen was supposed to be in Butch Cassidy with Newman, and that's where they had their differences. Also, they made another movie together, didn't they? Can't remember off the top of my head, but I am sure with all these movie buffs…………….
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