1943 – J Carrol Naish
Sahara
Honestly, I have never heard of this actor before. I have no idea what other films he’s been in, even though Wikipedia says he was in over 200 films in the Golden Age of Hollywood. But I have to say, he did a fine job in this movie. He played an Italian POW during WWII named Giuseppe. The actor was American-born, but he seemed to be able to speak fluent Italian, and his heavy Italian accent, when he spoke English, was constituent and believable.
Even though he was a supporting character, he had a few pretty dramatic moments that made him stand out. He even had the movie’s big anti-war speech. Despite what Mussolini tells us, I have no hate in my heart for Americans, which is a great sentiment to remember. He delivered that little monologue with a fair amount of passion and it sounded honest. After he delivers his speech to an evil Nazi who says he will denounce him as a traitor, he says he’d rather spend his remaining days as a POW in a prison than kill men he does not hate. He is murdered for his principles, but before he dies, he warns the movie’s heroes about the escaping Nazi, saving all their lives. That was definitely his big moment, but it wasn’t his only moment. I liked the one where he begs not to be left in the desert to die.
Naish really seemed to take his role seriously. This must have been a difficult movie to film. Everything took place in a desert and you could tell it wasn’t a set. You could practically feel the heat through the screen. Apparently, the makeup artist were able to make the men appear to be heavily perspiring by coating the actors’ faces with Vaseline and spraying them with water. Naish had a great close-up where the sweat looked real. But he, like all the dedicated actors, had to deal with sunburns and sandstorm, typical of filming in a desert location.
So despite being an Italian, who was supposed to be one of the enemies in the war, Naish did his job well and created a likeable character that probably helped to show Americans that the Italians were not the real bad guys. They were just ordinary people who happened to be on the wrong side of the fighting, most of whom were just obeying their leader. I appreciated the different perspective, and I liked Naish.