Let's Try For A Twofer

I watched both these movies before the Year In Review posts, so we'll see how much I can remember

Six Three Three Squadron - A Royal Air force squadron is tasked with destroying a German factory producing fuel for V-1 and V-2 rockets. Except the factory is positioned within a narrow fjord with a significant rock outcropping above it. So it's highly dangerous, but Commander Roy Grant (Cliff Robertson) and his pilots aren't given a choice. No worries, those Norwegian freedom fighters led by Lt. Bergman (George Chakiris) can knock out the German division manning the AA guns guarding then length of the fjord. Then he can return to England and be reunited with his sister Hilde (Maria Perschey), who may also be getting through Roy's cycnical, hard bitten shell.

What about two German divisions, though? Uh. . .

It's not a happy ending. Unless you are comforted by the idea that the squadron will continue to exist even though every single guy on the mission died. What? That's what Air Marshall basically says when it's pointed out they all died. But the squadron lives on. Oh, well, la-dee-da. Men died, but abstract constructs survived! Whoo!

The thing I don't understand is why, if the mission was so vitally important, they couldn't assign a few Mosquitos for ground attack. They send a dozen to drop bombs; they couldn't find two or three more to load up with guns and send in first, to try and wipe out the gun emplacements? I get they were working under a time constraint, but that didn't stop them from expecting the Norwegians to do all the prep work without support. If the mission has to succeed that badly, you go the extra mile to make sure it succeeds. As an added bonus, maybe you don't have as many of your men die as a result. Just a thought.

Saddle the Wind: I picked this one to watch because Rod Serling wrote the screenplay. I wanted to see what he'd do with an actual Western film. As it turns out, we have Steve and Tony Sinclair (Robert Taylor and John Cassavetes), owners of the Double S ranch. Steve used to be a hired gun who had to raise his brother. Tony's the kid brother who learned the wrong lessons, or perhaps just came out wrong. He doesn't really understand the difference between using a gun because you have to, versus using it because you want to, or think you have to. That's how it goes. Tony kills a man, a gunfighter that was looking for Steve. This causes problems with the local big wheel who knows about Steve's past, and does not want the kind of trouble it can bring.

That leads to Steve trying to rein Tony in, which only makes Tony buck harder. He thinks he has to prove how good he is, which only makes things worse, naturally. There's also Joan (Julie London), who Tony became smitten with on a business trip and brought home with him. She was looking for anyway out of singing in dive bars, but Tony's not as much of an upgrade as she hoped. But she still worries about him, and that leads to more trouble.

It's hard for me to decide whether Tony's actions are a consequence of growing up watching his brother, or something else. There's a sequence where Tony's practicing with his new gun. When he tires of firing at a skillet, he opens up on his own reflection in a puddle. Subtle it isn't. Still, there's the idea growing up with a skilled gunman for a brother, Tony learned what you'd expect a kid to learn. Guns are cool. Real men are good with guns. Any person who disagrees with you is disrespecting you, and the only answer for that is shooting. I don't think Steve wanted Tony to learn that, but there it is.