When French Foreign Legionnaire Kincaid (Burt Lancaster) is told of an impending attack on the outpost of in North Africa while he is imprisoned. In return for his freedom he and his men will distract the enemy until help arrived.
However he learns that the treacherous leader of the Riffs plans to marry Mahla, a girl from a rival tribe in order to create an alliance against the French. Kincaid kidnaps her and takes for the desert where both fall for each other.
Burt Lancaster was the tough, compassionate and dashing soldier several years before From Here to Eternity.
The plot nicely shot in Technicolour does have a hint of being shot in a Hollywood back lot rather than a desert. It also has a whole heap of campness especially with a bare chested Lancaster about to be tortured.
Its purely a film of its time with a light plot, broad humour, a clunky romance where the white soldier kidnaps the Arab princess and inexplicably fall in love. Still you feel that all involved had their tongues in their cheeks and went all out to entertain.
However he learns that the treacherous leader of the Riffs plans to marry Mahla, a girl from a rival tribe in order to create an alliance against the French. Kincaid kidnaps her and takes for the desert where both fall for each other.
Burt Lancaster was the tough, compassionate and dashing soldier several years before From Here to Eternity.
The plot nicely shot in Technicolour does have a hint of being shot in a Hollywood back lot rather than a desert. It also has a whole heap of campness especially with a bare chested Lancaster about to be tortured.
Its purely a film of its time with a light plot, broad humour, a clunky romance where the white soldier kidnaps the Arab princess and inexplicably fall in love. Still you feel that all involved had their tongues in their cheeks and went all out to entertain.