Kings Go Forth

Elmer Bernstein's score for "Kings Go Forth," at the start of the movie, is driven forward by percussion instruments. They keep the pace like a revolutionary drummer boy. We're watching American soldiers marching their way through the South of France, at the tail end of World War II. Libations and celebrations follow each stop on the liberation march-they called this the "Champagne Campaign." That's what leads Lt. Sam Loggins (Frank Sinatra) to the American-born French citizen Monique Blair (Natalie Wood.) Sinatra's ultra-vulnerable character spends the rest of the film in two forms of combat: he's fighting the Germans, and he's fighting his own emotions. After that initial march, the score settles down, into something more romantic.

The film, which is directed by Delmer Daves -- and is out now on Blu-ray, via a limited edition release from Twilight Time -- is not a traditional war picture. The score alone makes that obvious. (The disc offers an isolated score track, if you'd like to take a closer listen.) Then Monique marches us right into the territory of melodramas -- this movie is more like a hybrid. You can call it a "war weepie." Sam gets made into a third wheel after introducing Monique to Britt Hayes (Tony Curtis,) a man of money and culture. Monique sees him playing trumpet in a club, and she's in love before the first song is done. Sam, tragically, can't play like that. He's the one we're meant to weep for.

This may be a three-hander, but Sam's our identification figure from the very first step. Daves shoots most of the film in emotionally -- detached master shots, which are usually composed from the back wall of a given room. And there's voiceover from Sinatra in between many of the scenes, so we process each scene from a first-person perspective anyway. Often his musings are offered for the sake of exposition, so that we can understand the shots that can't explain themselves. For instance, we see Britt leaving an officer's room with empty hands -- and Sam tells us he's delaying making his engagement to Monique official. But sometimes, the voiceover lets us into Sam's head, and shows us where the conflicts are coming from. As he's first getting to know Britt, he explains himself: "I guess I gave him a hard time at first," he admits, "partly because he was born rich and handsome, and I was born poor and not handsome."

Twilight Time's Blu-ray release of the film features their usual selection of extra features: in addition to the isolated score track, there are theatrical trailers, and a booklet featuring a contextual essay by Julie Kirgo (she offers background on the film's Oscar-loaded cast and crew, including underappreciated figures like cinematographer Daniel Fapp.) And the high-definition presentation does wonders for the film itself -- especially in the rare moments where Daves decides to go close-up. Each character gets one moment where the camera slowly zooms in, giving them its complete attention. They come at moments of climax -- as revelations and decisions are made. The zooms come in so close that they seem to be invading the character's personal space. So we seem to be invading along with it.

No one seems to object. The war has turned those personal spaces into rubble -- if these characters have boundaries, they're covered in ash. There are class lines separating this trio as well, even if the lines themselves have been muddled. The biggest division between the three is revealed during one of those close-up's, when Monique tells about her parentage: her father was an African-American. By the sight of Sam's face while he hears it, we know that's a taboo strong enough to drown out gunfire. When he tells Britt about that secret, a bomb goes off just as the sentence leaves his mouth. And in that moment, the subgenre itself makes perfect sense: thanks to our national complexes regarding class and race, the bedroom doubles as a battlefield.

"Kings Go Forth"
Blu-ray
Screenarchives.com
$29.95