The White Tower (1950)

An odd bunch of people decide to climb a mountain in the Swiss Alps that supposedly has never been climbed. It's headed up by the daughter (Alida Valli) of a man who tried to climb it once before. She ropes in a guide, a friend of her father, an American architect who flew during the war (Glenn Ford). Then a struggling alcoholic writer (Claude Rains) with an emasculating wife asks in, as does a Mr. Hein (Lloyd Bridges).

Everything's going smooth and easy at first, other than Hein's insistence they should keep moving because, 'To rest is not to conquer.' Certainly not ominous. But it's not as though the world had just gone through a difficult phase highlighted by Germans trying to conquer things!

Things go south rapidly once they reach the point where they have to start really climbing, searching for handholds and using ropes. Hein grows increasingly aggressive and demanding of the pace and Rains' begins to buckle. Valli's old friend recognizes he's hit his limit and turns back, and Ford questions going on as well. He only came along trying to make time with Valli, after all. Valli seems torn between completing the climb and risking the lives of the others to do. At least a couple of these people are old friends. Is it that important to complete what her father started, if it kills them in the process?

Ford, somewhat abruptly, decides he's not gonna let the Nazi get up the mountain first. Remarkable how long it took any of them to notice his hat with the silver Nazi eagle symbol on it. He'd only been wearing it the entire climb. I don't really understand his motivation. Hein's, I get. He thinks it'll be some great tribute to the will of the German people, how they aren't really beaten and will rise again. Yeah, just like the South. Gonna rise any day now.

But Ford's character? I'm less sure. Maybe he's trying to prove something to himself. He came to this region because it was where he was shot down during the war, so he feels a certain connection, but maybe he's running from something. And meeting Hein forces him to dig down and take something seriously again. Maybe.