Steineded How sad is this?

Voxitype Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

Portia Hilton Blistering performances.

Philippa All of these films share one commonality, that being a kind of emotional center that humanizes a cast of monsters.

ETO_Buff This is the most ridiculous movie I have ever seen. If it had been the Marx Brothers or Laurel & Hardy, the level of stupidity of this movie would almost be acceptable. However, neither of those comedy teams would have done a film this bad. This is not meant to be a comedy, although one cannot help laughing at it. It is truly inconceivable that a film studio would release something like this. Here's the premise: a group of bootleggers that have just been released from a prison stretch are approached by the United States government to go into Berlin undercover and assassinate Hitler. Not only is premise stupid, the execution is even worse. It's no wonder that so many American civilians had no idea what the war was really like for those that experienced it first-hand, what with films like this on the big screen to reduce reality to comic proportions!

gullwing592003 The only reason I wanted to see this World War Two propaganda film was the presence of Ward Bond in a leading role which he handled very well & was completely convincing & believable. He had an enormous screen presence & personality & he could've easily became a leading actor if he really wanted to but he was content in small & distinguished supporting roles. He was quite versatile & is often associated with John Wayne in the John Ford directed films. Ward Bond was literally in just about every film to name a few like "It Happened One Night" (1934) he was an extra in "G-Men" (1935) "Night Key" with Boris Karloff (1937), "Dead End" (1937), "Prison Break" with Barton Maclane (1938), "Gone With The Wind" (1939) he was an extra in "Son Of Frankenstein" (1939), "The Maltese Falcon" (1941), "It's A Wonderful Life" (1946), "Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye" with James Cagney (1950) etc. He was in hundred's of movies.He often played cops & gangsters & I thought he did a good job in the leading role of the patriotic gangster. The cast is solid with established actors like Paul Fix & Warren Hymer who often played stupid gangsters. Sure the plot is far fetched but it was 1942 & WW2 was a very popular war inspiring national patriotism. The film was obviously a wartime moral booster while at the same time trying to sustain & save a dying genre: the gangster film & in 1942 what better way to sell a gangster movie than to turn the gangsters into patriotic American hero's on an improbable mission to knock off Adolf Hitler. It may be a little campy today but in it's day this movie was probably taken seriously by 1942 audiences. Think about it, the film was obviously intended to be serious & it's not a bad watch & I would watch it again & it's by far superior to the Ed Wood films.There is really no comparison & there is a lot worse movies out there than this. Don't forget Ed Wood was voted the worst director of all time, an honor & title he fittingly deserves. It doesn't get any worse than Ed Wood not even an Elvis Presley movie.

theowinthrop Reportedly, in April 1865, upon hearing the dreadful news from Washington, D.C., Benjamin Disraeli made the comment that "Assassination has never changed history!". A brave statement, but dubious. Lincoln's murder took a first rate political mind and spirit out of an office that needed him, and put in a misguided, ill prepared man with some sense of his office's importance. The result was that Lincoln's hope to restore the Union with a benign peace was wrecked by the inept President Andrew Johnson and the Radical Republican Congress which sought a harsher peace on the South. John Wilkes Booth had changed history indeed.Same happened in 44 B.C. when Julius Caesar was killed. Same happened in 1914 when Archduke Franz Ferdinand was killed and World War I broke out. Assassination does effect history.In 1942 two Czech patriots were parachuted into their homeland to carry out a mission. They did - they killed Reinhart Heydrich, the "Hangman" "Protector" of Bohemia, and creator of the Final Solution. Heydrich was in a car that was blown up, and it is pleasant to announced that the creep actually died from being skewered by eight heavy springs in the seat that he was seated in - it took him over a week to die. Given his involvement in the Holacaust and other atrocities, one can only say he died the way he deserved. Unfortunately, the Germans destroyed two villages, and killed hundreds of people in retaliation. Because of that the Allies did not carry out any other assassination plots in Europe against Nazis.But the notion of killing Nazi leaders was instilled in the air, and I think that is why this film was made soon after. To Americans Heydrich was vaguely known (after the destruction of Lidice and the other village interest in the "Hangman" led to two films being made: Fritz Lang's HANGMEN ALSO DIE and Douglas Sirk's HITLER'S MADMAN). HITLER, DEAD OR ALIVE is not a good film - it is really rather stupid. The idea of hiring three American criminals to kill Der Fuhrer is outlandish. But to be fair, this idea of criminals fighting the good fight against Nazis was fairly common in Hollywood films. Nazis never fought fairly, so we needed someone who also fought unfairly. Witness Humphrey Bogart and his co-horts in ALL THROUGH THE NIGHT (against Conrad Veidt) or Alan Ladd in THIS GUN FOR HIRE (admittedly against traitors working for Japan, not Germany) or LUCKY JORDAN. Still, if you want to kill the most vicious government leader in history, why use three gunman instead of working out a plan with the government. So if you have problems with this, you will have problems with the entire film.The only thing I liked about this movie was when Bobs Watson (as Hitler) makes a comment to a cohort that he eventually plans to doublecross Mussolini. Perhaps it might have happened sooner or later, but Der Fuhrer actually had a high regard for Il Duce, and later in the war sent his leading special agent, Otto Skorzeny, into Italy to rescue the imprisoned ex-head of the government. Still it was amusing to hear that. Otherwise, the film was a total wash-out.

astrea This film is what _Desperate Journey_ (Errol Flynn and Ronald Reagan) might have been if it had been a B-film. (I know: _Desperate Journey_ isn't that good to start with---that's the problem!) Three ex-gangsters take up a wealthy man's offer of 1 MILLION dollars to anyone who can bring in Hitler--dead or alive. The three join the RCAF(why?) and parachute their way into Germany, bringing along their hapless pilot. I wish I could say that the film builds to a tension-filled climax, but every scene becomes even more (unintentionally) hilarious. The leaden dialogue is more than matched by the mind-bogglingly-dreadful German accents affected by the leading players. ("Vat? Ve haf only until Sursday, hmm?") In one scene, a sneering guard actually checks passes by repeating "So! So! So!" In hindsight, some of the portrayals of wartime Germany are actually touchingly innocent: the small prison holding the three gangsters is identified as "Dachau," a name that did not yet have horror associated with it. Now we know...Like many an earnest wartime film, _Hitler: DoA_ had a sincere message (there is more to the Nazi menace than Adolf Hitler). Yet I have a hard time believing that, even in wartime, its schlocky delivery moved very many Americans to consider the deeper meaning of the war in which they wre engaged (yeah, right!) This one was definitely for the kids, an attempt to re-make the American gangster film with a wartime theme, proving that even American criminals have a basic grasp of decency and heroism, far above that shown by the evil Nazis. Throw in lots of chases and shoot-em-ups, and voila! You have a gangster film magically metamorphosed into patriotic material. If you don't expect too much, you can enjoy this one as an almost-fun bit of camp.