From the Rental Vault (1945): Objective, Burma!

Although it's not hard to imagine a war movie being controversial, Raoul Walsh's Objective, Burma! has a rather singular pedigree in the protests it earned. A fictionalized version of the missions of "Merrill's Marauders," a paratrooper division that conducted search-and destroy raids in southeast Asia during World  War II, the movie drew heavy criticism from English lawmakers and even Prime Minister Winston Churchill. Most of the fighting in the Burma theater was done by British, Indian and other U.K. Commonwealth forces, but Objective largely leaves them out in favor of one of the few American elements serving in the area at the time. It was eventually released in England in 1952, accompanied by a filmed apology to the British armed services.

It's definitely one of the better war movies cranked out during the 1940s. Walsh and star Errol Flynn don't hesitate to show the American soldiers heros for their dangerous work, but they trim down the artificial rah-rah that some other movies roll around in. Flynn is Captain Nelson, who commands a paratrooper division given the task of blowing up a Japanese radar station inside occupied Burma. They succeed, but Japanese patrols cut them off from their rendezvous with their pick-up planes and they have to try to return to their base on foot, surrounded by Japanese soldiers and hunted by patrols.

Flynn and his fellow castmembers fill the traditional soldier roles you often see in war movie, and they do so quite well. In fact, several of them give the characters unexpected dimension, helped along by Alvah Bessie's Oscar-nominated story and dialogue. One weary trooper, asked by his buddy what he plans to do when he gets out of this mess, says, "Two things. One, I'm gonna kiss my girl like she's never been kissed." "What's two?" the buddy asks. "Then I'm gonna take off my parachute," he's told.

Walsh's direction boosts things as well. He uses little to no music during some intense scenes, more of which involve waiting for combat instead of the fighting itself. Overhead shots emphasize how the soldiers in both armies could appear and disappear in the thick jungle, as quiet scenes are suddenly but briefly disturbed by the appearance of men, but soon fall back to the same quiet as though no one was ever there.

Objective has a little bit of a rough edge with regards to the Japanese soldiers and the way the men speak about them, but I imagine that seeing your friends fall to the enemy bullets and bombs didn't sweeten the milk of human kindness towards them -- and since I wasn't one of the ones facing down those guns and planes, I'll take a pass on criticizing the movie for being of a piece with its times.

Some unexpected reflection on war and soldiering, and more than a hint of recalling Xenophon's Anabasis make Objective, Burma! a legitimate holder of its title as one of the better World War II movies .