This is not one of Alan Ladd's best films, though it is enjoyable and worth seeing. What makes it more so is the nice Italian locale as well as the music (which, incidentally, won the Oscar).
"Captain Carey, USA" begins with a flashback to WWII. Ladd is an OSS agent sent behind enemy lines to gather information in fascist Italy. He and his friends are captured by the Nazis and apparently he's the only survivor--though he was injured and spent years in the rehabilitation. Someone must have betrayed them and when he sees a painting in a gallery that came from the home from which he was hiding during the war, he decides to return. His arrival is a surprise--partly because the people in this small town were so nasty and unwelcoming and mostly because his old girlfriend (who he thought dead) was alive and married! Ladd wants to return home as a result of all this, but a series of murders that seem linked to the betrayal convince him to stay and find out who is responsible.
The film has a few nice twists here and there and Ladd is his usual macho self. And, like most of Ladd's other films, it is filled with the shortest actors Paramount could muster--due to Ladd's diminutive size they needed to make this less apparent by pairing him with small actors! Enjoyable but far from his best.
"Captain Carey, USA" begins with a flashback to WWII. Ladd is an OSS agent sent behind enemy lines to gather information in fascist Italy. He and his friends are captured by the Nazis and apparently he's the only survivor--though he was injured and spent years in the rehabilitation. Someone must have betrayed them and when he sees a painting in a gallery that came from the home from which he was hiding during the war, he decides to return. His arrival is a surprise--partly because the people in this small town were so nasty and unwelcoming and mostly because his old girlfriend (who he thought dead) was alive and married! Ladd wants to return home as a result of all this, but a series of murders that seem linked to the betrayal convince him to stay and find out who is responsible.
The film has a few nice twists here and there and Ladd is his usual macho self. And, like most of Ladd's other films, it is filled with the shortest actors Paramount could muster--due to Ladd's diminutive size they needed to make this less apparent by pairing him with small actors! Enjoyable but far from his best.