John Hodiak Movies

Director Henry King's adaptation of John Hersey's novel is a faithful telling of the story of Major Joppolo (John Hodiak), who is assigned to administrate the Sicilian town of Adano after World War II and attempts to return it to its pre-war tranquility. His initial actions include feeding and clothing the villagers, who have been left starved and destitute by the ravages of the war, and preventing the hanging of its former mayor, a Mussolini supporter, although he makes clear that any hints of Fascism will not be tolerated. Suspicious at first, the villagers finally come to trust Joppolo when he works to reclaim the town bell, stolen from the city hall and a symbol of its identity. Gene Tierney plays the fisherman's daughter that Joppolo falls for, while William Bendix is his compassionate orderly and assistant. A Bell For Adano is a low-key look at the effects of war that builds to a quietly powerful conclusion. ~ Don Kaye, All Movie Guide

All but forgotten today, A Stranger in Town serves as an excellent showcase for the dramatic talents of Frank Morgan. The star plays Supreme Court justice John Josephus Grant, who decides to take a break from his hectic schedule by going on a hunting vacation. Travelling incognito, Grant stops over in a small town that turns out to be a hotbed of political corruption. Taking a liking to honest young mayoral candidate Bill Adams (Richard Carlson), Grant uses his legal know-how to help thwart Adams' crooked opponents. Jean Rogers, best-known to film buffs as Dale Arden in the first two "Flash Gordon" serials, is decorative as Grant's secretary, who (of course!) falls in love with the clean-cut Bill Adams. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Ambush is a tight, well-paced western, expertly assembled by veteran director Sam Wood, whose last film this was. Robert Taylor stars as an Indian scout, sent to rescue a woman who is somewhere deep in Apache territory. The woman's sister, naturally, goes along for the ride: she is played by Arlene Dahl, then in her considerable prime. Outside of its feminine angle, Ambush is packed with action from first frame to last. Released to theatres at the tail end of 1949, the film was an unqualified success with holiday audiences. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

In this exciting Korean War-era actioner, two Marine combat photographers risk their lives on the front to chronicle the battles. When not behaving heroically up there, they are competing for the affection of a pretty Red Cross nurse. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

Command Decision is a stagebound but consummately acted adaptation of William Wister Haines' Broadway play. Clark Gable, starring in the role essayed on Broadway by Paul Kelly, plays Air Force Brigadier General "Casey" Dennis. With time at a premium, Dennis sends waves of bomber squadrons into Germany to knock out the enemy's jet plane factories. Though Dennis seems utterly unconcerned about the fate of his pilots (even his superior officer Walter Pidgeon is appalled by the heavy losses), the audience knows that his duty is exacting a severe emotional toll on him. Thanks to pressure from a misguided US senator, "butcher" Dennis is replaced by the supposedly more humane Brian Donlevy. But Donlevy realizes that Gable's decisions were the correct ones, and he vows to continue his predecessor's "suicide missions". ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Desert Fury is a rarety for the 1940s, a Technicolor "film noir." Set in a Nevada gambling town, the story concerns the various misadventures, romantic and otherwise, of Paula Haller (Lizabeth Scott), the rebellious daughter of gambling-house proprietress Fritzie Haller (Mary Astor, who steals the picture). Though no better than she ought to be, Fritzie is determined that Paula will not grow up as a "shady lady", but she'd fighting an uphill battle. John Hodiak plays crooked gambler Eddie Bendix (John Hodiak), who tries to exploit Paula's fascination with him for his own gain. Thank heaven that upright lawman Tom Hanson (Burt Lancaster) is on hand to rescue the heroine from the machinations of Bendix and his partner-in-perfidy Johnny Ryan (Wendell Corey). Desert Fury was adapted from the far racier and more explicit novel by Ramona Stewart. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

When Homecoming was first released in 1948, some observers felt that Clark Gable's unusually sensitive performance was based on his own memories of losing his wife Carole Lombard in a 1942 plane crash. Intriguingly, Gable's Homecoming co-star is Lana Turner, with whom it was rumored that he was having an affair at the time of Lombard's death. Told in flashback, the story concerns the romance of war-time army surgeon Ulysses Delby Johnson (Gable) and Red Cross nurse Lt. Jane "Snapshot" McCall (Turner). Though married, Johnson cannot help to be drawn to Jane as they slog through the hellish battlegrounds of Italy and France. As the war draws to a close, Johnson is faced with a dilemma: how can he find happiness with Jane without bringing misery to his beloved wife Penny (Anne Baxter). As it turns out, Fate intervenes to solve Johnson's problem. Though well-acted and directed, Homecoming is just too thin to be spread out over 12 reels. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Based on the novel by Agatha Christie and play by Frank Vosper, Love From a Stranger isn't quite as good as the 1937 version of the same property. This time, Sylvia Sidney and John Hodiak play the roles originally filled by Ann Harding and Basil Rathbone. Falling under the romantic spell of charismatic Manuel Cortez (Hodiak), impressionable sweepstakes winner Cecily Harrington (Sidney) marries him after a whirlwind courtship. It doesn't take long for Cecily to figure out that Cortez is a dangerous psychotic, bent on murdering his wife and claiming her fortune. Unable to convince anyone else of Cortez intentions (even though his behavior would, in real life, get him locked away in a minute), Cecily determines to outsmart her husband and catch him in his own trap. Ironically, Frank Vosper never saw either film version of Love From a Stranger, having died under mysterious circumstances in 1937 (too bad Agatha Christie never wrote that story!) ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide

Spencer Tracy and James Stewart team up for this World War II adventure, based on an supposedly true incident from World War II. Stewart plays John Royer, an ex-newspaper reporter with a backhand knowledge of Malaya, and Tracy plays a criminal named Carnaghan, doing time in Alcatraz for smuggling. They are brought together for an undercover assignment -- to smuggle a large shipment of rubber out of Japanese-held territory in Malaya and deliver the tonnage to awaiting U.S. ships. Carnaghan and Royer plod through the jungles and have to deal with several unscrupulous contacts including a man calling himself The Dutchman (Sydney Greenstreet), a helpful FBI agent named Kellar (John Hodiak), and a sneaky Japanese officer by the name of Colonel Tomura (Richard Loo). ~ Paul Brenner, All Movie Guide

In this Korean War drama, a strong-willed, stubborn greenhorn pilot becomes obsessed with avenging the death of his brother who died during an aerial skirmish with the deadly Chinese "volunteer" pilots. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

The men behind America's first venture into space are honored in this drama that paid special emphasis on historical accuracy and obtained much input and assistance from the US Air Force. The story centers on an Air Force doctor who performs many detailed test to discover how the human body will respond to the rigors of space travel including its reactions to being ejected in a space capsule from 45,000 feet, to traveling 1,000 miles per hour in a rocket sled, and ascending to 100,000 feet in a balloon. His devoted wife supports him all the way even though he sometimes insists on using himself as a guinea pig. ~ Sandra Brennan, All Movie Guide

One can only imagine the reaction of arch-conservative MGM head Louis B. Mayer when Song of Russia first tumbled over the spools in the studio projection room. It must be remembered, however, that back in 1944 it was politically expedient for Hollywood to offer hosannas to America's Russian allies, and to gloss over the less-attractive aspects of the Stalin regime. Based on Scorched Earth, a story by Leo Mittler, the film stars Robert Taylor as John Meredith, a famous American symphony conductor who is touring Russia just before the war. Meredith falls in love with Russian lass Nadya Stepanova (Susan Peters), who impresses him with her conviviality and charm: why, she's almost like a typical American girl! In the course of their romance, Meredith and Nadya visit a collective farm, where the peasants sing, dance and smile all day. The lovers marry, only to have their honeymoon abruptly halted when the Nazis invade the Soviet Union. Nadya promptly joins the Resistance, solemnly assembling molotov cocktails and shooting down Germans with her comrades. Just before the Nazis swarm into Nadya's village, the peasants set fire to the place so that Hitlers minions will not be able to plunder its resources. All of this is played out against the music of Tschiakovsky and other Russian composers. During the HUAC investigations in the early 1950s, several of the personnel involved in Song of Russia were required to explain why they'd been involved in so blatantly "pro-communist" a project. Louis B. Mayer blithely explained that he "just wanted to make a picture about Russians, not communists," while star Robert Taylor -- likewise a staunch anti-Red -- insisted that he'd been forced to make the film, and that he'd demanded script deletions throughout productions. In the end, the losers were screenwriters Richard Collins and Paul Jarrico, both of whom ended up on the egregious Hollywood Blacklist, simply for adhering to America's wartime pro-Soviet sentiments. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide