This new print of Nicholas Ray's 1958 war pic is The First Essential Re-Release Of 2004™. Discarding gung-ho clichés as it portrays the conflict between Allied officers Richard Burton and Curt Jürgens during a raid on Rommel's HQ, it's a bleak character study in a forbidding desert. Both men are threatened by inner doubts and both wind up broken. Totally compelling.
