User Reviews

Legend has it that on the Eve of St. Mark's day, a maiden stepping into a church will see the people who will die the following year. It comes in handy when a group of soldiers marooned on a Philippine island fighting the Japanese, find themselves lost and probably dead in a short time.

The story begins on a positive note as Quizz West, an eager young farm boy joins the army for a year stint. Coming home on a leave, Quizz brings along Janet, the girl he has fallen in love with, and who he will have to leave behind as he goes back. His parents, the Wests, are delighted with the choice; Quizz could not have elected a better person.

As fate would have it, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor, resulting in prolonging Quizz's stint, but wanting to serve his country in the hour of need, he goes to the Pacific theater of operations with his company. The men bonded since training camp and keep fighting together. During that time most men contracted malaria. With short supplies, they have to deal with a debilitating disease and the Japanese air power in the Philippines.

A seldom seen film based on a theater piece by Maxwell Anderson, and adapted for the screen by George Seaton. The film was entirely shot inside the 20th Century Fox studios in California. John Stahl, the director, shows great ways in which he opened the film, including the war sequences that are convincing if one realizes the constrains of the production. The valor of the men in battle, as well as the camaraderie in basic training.

The achievement of Mr. Stahl in the film was the level of acting he got from the cast that was gathered for the picture. Anne Baxter shows up as the sweet Janet, the girlfriend from home. William Eythe, as Pvt. West showed promise. Best of all is Michael O'Shea, a wonderful actor doing an excellent take as Thomas Mulveroy, the devoted fan of his Brooklyn Dodgers. Seen in minor roles, Frank Morgan, Ruth Nelson, Ray Collins, Dickie Moore, and the excellent Vincent Price as Pvt. Marion.

I doubt if Mr H.Morgan ever gave a poor performance throughout his long career - unfortunately the same cannot be said about Mr V.Price who veers wildly from ham to camp and back again in "The eve of St Mark" a 1944 propaganda picture designed to reassure moms,dads,sisters and wives that sending their menfolk off to war was a Good Thing. The ill - fated Mr W.Eythe is nominally the lead but Messrs Morgan and Price carry the main weight and are the polar opposite reasons that make the movie worth watching in a bizarrely fascinating sort of way. It may have satisfied American moviegoers at the time when the Invasion of Europe was on everybody's lips and the task of licking the Japs was dragging on a bit,but it's heart on sleeve appeal for patriotism and sacrifice fails to win many admirers in today's more cynical audience whose trust in Government and politicians has been sorely tried for many years. The usual cross section of white 1940s American Society -Country Boy,Tough Yank,Irish Rebel,Southern Aristo etc etc - end up on a Pacific Island debating whether to fight or run having failed to turn the tide against the Jap hordes who are now bombing the crxp out of them. Together with a "Doc" and a "Sarge",these boys are willing to go to hell and back for Uncle Sam by golly.But don't count on the "..and back" part. The folks back home,in touch by letter,decide in the end to allow their minor son to join the Air Force with their blessing,grinning bravely and getting down to the business of running their farm to keep America fighting. Mr Price manages to keep a straight face if not a Southern Accent as he mangles Shakespeare.Mr Morgan,rather more pragmatic, expresses doubts as to whether things will ever be different for the working man - you've got that about right Harry. In the end the boys decide to fight on(phew!). In the meantime the real G.I.s waiting in their bases in England to die in their thousands liberating a Europe that only too soon would be endeavouring to minimise their sacrifice for reasons of nationalistic realpolitik,and holed up in Japanese held islands in a disease - ridden nightmare would have laughed "The eve of St Mark" off the screen. No high - falutin' speeches required,no bristle - jawed cynicism,just the desire to get on with the job and go home.Maybe to mom and dad's farm,maybe to the factory floor or the faded grandeur of the Old South. And the overwhelming urge to kick Mr V.Price's precious arse.

There's something nicely symmetrical in the fact that this movie was adapted from a play by Maxwell Anderson. Almost forgotten today Anderson began his career with the Broadway hit play What Price Glory (co-written with Lawrence Stallings). Produced in 1924 and twice filmed it was, of course, set in World War One and was a comedy about the love-hate relationship between Flagg and Quirt, sergeant and private. Twenty years on Anderson was more philosophical as perhaps befits someone with a penchant for writing in blank verse. He also turned his hand to writing lyrics and collaborated twice with composer Kurt Weill on Knickerbocker Holiday and Lost In The Stars, neither exactly laff riots though the former did produce the evergreen September Song. By 1944 the was was definitely swinging in the favour of the Allies but this didn't guarantee that no blood was spilled. Farmboy William Eythe is the main protagonist but both his family, sweetheart, and his platoon get plenty of screen time and equit themselves well, not least Ray Collins, usually a belligerent banker/politician but here subdued as Eythe's farmer father. Ann Baxter may be wasted as Eythe's girl back home but there is a nice ensemble feel to the whole thing. Dated, perhaps, but still worth a look.

"War in perpetuity is neo-liberalism gasping for survival. It is a gasping that necessitates paying for such folly forever." - Jozef Hand-Boniakowski

"The Eve of St Mark" is a 1944 war film directed by John M. Stahl. Stahl removes the bleakness of Maxwell Anderson's Broadway play, upon which the film was based, and instead ops for some low key flag waving. When he's not drooling over various trinkets of Americana – squeaky clean, fresh faced American boys, farm folk who support war with a heavy heart, mothers nobly offering their sons to the state, big breasted lovers at home waiting for their hunks to return, cosy farm houses and bible belt corn fields, sexy foreign chicks who are thankful to brave American GI's – the film treats us to long speeches which covertly nail home the virtues and necessities of war, whilst bemoaning how unfair it is for a poor and victimised Uncle Sam to have been attacked at Pearl Harbour by evil slant eyed Japanese.

"Why are we fighting foreigners here in 1944 when we have no food on our tables at home for ourselves and our families?" one character asks. "So American boys in 1954 will have food on their tables," another replies. And that's what the film endorses; the manufacturing of war in the search for surplus value, bloodshed as a necessary component of fiscal growth.

The film is notable for staring Vincent Price in a rare "good guy" role. It's quite odd seeing such an iconic face, one oft associated with scifi and horror, in a war movie. Today "The Eve of St Mark's" brain-dead jingoism and gore glorification can be found in such films as "Black Hawk Down", "We Were Soldiers", "Saving Private Ryan", "300", "Zulu" etc. The tech's changed, but the story's the same.

6/10 – For war buffs only.