Anthony Mann

Anthony Mann (June 30, 1906 – April 29, 1967) was an American actor and film director, most notably of films noir and Westerns. As a director, he often collaborated with the cinematographer John Alton and with actor James Stewart in his Westerns.

Life and career

Mann was born Emil Anton Bundsmann in San Diego, California. His father, Emile Theodore Bundsmann, an academic, was from an Austrian Catholic family, and his mother, Bertha Weichselbaum, a drama teacher, was an American of Bavarian-Jewish descent. Mann started out as an actor, appearing in plays off-Broadway in New York City. In 1938, he moved to Hollywood, where he joined the Selznick International Pictures. He was married to the actress Sara Montiel.

Mann became an assistant director by the 1940s, assisting Preston Sturges on the film Sullivan's Travels, and subsequently directing low-budget assignments for RKO and Republic Pictures.

In 1964 he was head of the jury at the 14th Berlin International Film Festival.

In 1967, Mann died from a heart attack in Berlin, Germany while filming the spy thriller A Dandy in Aspic. The film was completed by the film's star, Laurence Harvey.

Men in War

Men in War is a 1957 war film about the Korean War directed by Anthony Mann and starring Robert Ryan and Aldo Ray as the leaders of a small detachment of American soldiers cut off and desperately trying to rejoin their division. The events of the film take place on one day; 6 September 1950. The picture was based on a 1949 World War II novel of the Normandy campaignDay Without End by Van Van Praag that was retitled Combat in 1951.

Some sources claim that credited screenwriter Philip Yordan was actually fronting for the blacklisted Ben Maddow. The Pentagon refused any cooperation with the producer and condemned the film for its depicition of a US Army unit without discipline.

Most of the same cast and crew made God's Little Acre the following year.

Plot

On 6 September 1950, an isolated and exhausted platoon of the 24th Infantry Division is cut off. In addition to losing radio contact, the platoon is harassed by unseen North Korean infiltrators who silently kill the Americans and take their weapons. Platoon commander Lieutenant Benson (Robert Ryan) has only vague instructions to reach a certain hill to link up with American forces.