Sahara (1943) on Netflix
Cut off after the fall of Tobruk, Master Sergeant Joe Gunn leads his tank crew and survivors south across Libya. They hold an isolated well with little water against a German battalion.
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Trailer
Plot summary
In 1942, the crew of the tank Lulubelle, attached to the British Eighth Army, becomes separated from its unit during the retreat from German forces after Tobruk falls. Master Sergeant Joe Gunn commands the crew, which heads south across the Libyan desert and picks up survivors at a bombed field hospital, among them medical officer Captain Halliday, who yields command to Gunn, several Commonwealth soldiers and Corporal Leroux of the Free French. Riding on the tank, the group meets Sergeant Major Tambul of the Sudan Defence Force, with his Italian captive Giuseppe, who takes them to a well at Hassan Barani. The well is dry, so Tambul guides them to Bir Acroma, where the water comes only in a trickle. German scouts arrive, and the men learn that a German battalion in need of water is following close behind.
Cast
Did you know?!Facts and trivia about Sahara (1943)
Can contain spoilers, watch the movie first.
- Kurt Kreuger, who played Captain von Schletow, was nearly suffocated filming Sahara: co-star Rex Ingram, as Sgt. Major Tambul, pressed his face into the sand and director Zoltán Korda forgot to yell cut until Kreuger went unconscious.
- Sahara's lead was offered to Gary Cooper, Glenn Ford and Brian Donlevy before Humphrey Bogart; Donlevy was tired of war films and Bogart weary of gangster roles, so the two actors swapped assignments, Bogart taking Sahara and Donlevy a comedy.
- To fake the Libyan desert, Zoltán Korda had 2,000 tons of sand hauled onto hard-packed soil, had it spray-painted and blown for ripples and shadows painted on hills, and makeup artist Henry Pringle coated actors' faces in vaseline and water to imitate perspiration.
- With no German equipment available, American gear was dressed with German markings: the plane that attacks the tank was an early Allison-powered P-51 Mustang, and the German half-track and machine guns were an American M2 and a Vickers gun.
- Humphrey Bogart's third wife, Mayo Methot, was the only woman on the desert location and reportedly brought him lunch from Brawley every day; no women appear in the film.
