No, this isn't a post about Andes Mints, though there have probably been some folks along the way who wouldn't have minded this Andes in their mouth. Ha ha! I've been exploring unusual entertainment options as of late (well, perhaps that in itself isn't so unusual for me!) and I fell upon the most obscure movie. The vaguely "cursing" title got my attention and then after a glimpse at the poster I decided that I needed to at least give it a look. While it's hardly a stellar classic, it really delivered far more than I expected from its rock-bottom budget and limited cast. The movie is called
Surrender - Hell! (1959) Based on a true story of survival in the Philippines during WWII, it stars Keith Andes. As is often the case, I now bring you a few of the highlights.
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Andes portrays Col. Donald Blackburn, stationed on the island of Luzon in the midst of a Japanese takeover. While the majority of U.S. soldiers on site opt to surrender, Andes spirits away and begins to hike through the unrelenting jungle terrain to the opposite side of the island.
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Eventually, he falls in with a band of civilian refugees who are under constant threat of discovery by the Japanese soldiers on patrol. Andes finds himself hiding beneath a large rock slab with a female who is trying to make her way home.
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Said female is Susan Cabot, playing a Filipino (!) lady who'd been caring for a sick uncle prior to the invasion. Now the only survivor of his household, she's trekking back to her parents' home on the opposite side.
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They join up to complete the journey, but Andes is soon felled by a nasty case of malaria and can't go on.
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After setting up a small camp, Cabot locates some supplied from an abandoned home nearby and uses some food and utensils found there to make Andes some rice soup.
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Thanks to her TLC, Andes eventually regains his strength and can continue on.
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Along the way, an inviting swimming hole is discovered and the two take time out for a refreshing frolic.
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It's not revealed as to whether Cabot retrieved this swimsuit (!) along with the ratty pot and rice she obtained from the house, but there she is wearing it nonetheless...! I prayed that Andes was skinny-dipping.
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| Yes...? |
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| ...YES? |
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Nope... He's got some briefs on (that I doubt would've been army issued!)
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In any case, it was a welcome injection of beefcake to the proceedings.
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I mean, if you have to cross a jungle to escape a plethora of enemy troops, this is the way to do it.
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Suddenly, they hear some of the troops I'm referring to and have to instantly take cover.
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One of the soldiers descends into the grotto-like swimming hole and discovers Cabot's clothes. Luckily, they evade capture, but the need to cower closely together leads to some startling intimacy between them.
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Cabot's fear almost could read as ecstasy as the wet couple clings to one another.
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Cabot's got almost nothing to wear as they proceed onward, so Andes gives her his shirt, for which not only she, but also we, are grateful.
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Their arduous trek across the island is almost over.
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They finally make it to her parents' where we're treated to not only the sight of their lovely home, but also the sight of Andes' lovely torso.
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Unfortunately, before long, Andes (hiding in the nearby hayloft) has come down with a relapse of malaria. Cabot is again left to nurse him. (This time in a pretty and stylish sundress!)
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Right when he's moaning about being hot with fever, more enemy soldiers appear at the homestead! Cabot has to keep him quiet as they search and loot the place.
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Initially, I thought I'd found one of my infamous bulges in this shot, but it turned out to be just a crease in the fabric of his trousers. (Even with that said, it could be a leftover impression... Don't believe me? Google image search Andes' nude modeling pics. You'll see.) But then, just like that, Cabot is out of the movie!
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Andes has one period alongside some rebel forces led by a pony-tailed female guerilla before heading to another village with a band of resistance fighters. There, he comes into contact with still another lady. This one is all fired-up over her brother's death. After some initial antagonism towards Andes, she decides to join him in his efforts to defeat the Japanese. Portrayed by the single-named Paraluman, she is forever being misidentified in photos as Cabot thanks to their similar hairstyles (and requisite 3-inch eyebrows!)
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I'm glad that whoever made this movie knew where most of its strengths lie... For not long after meeting the fiery Paraluman, Andes is seen washing up behind a woven screen.
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The scene is set up with implications that are rather delicious, but unfortunately the effect is spoiled when we inadvertently spy some low-slung shorts on Andes right off the bat...
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Anyway, he's over there soaping himself up all over.
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Then he, for some reason, calls Paraluman over in order for her to rinse him down!
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She puts down the items she was carrying as he smugly informs her how and where he'd like her to pour the carton of rinse water onto him.
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She obligingly does his shoulders and back. But when it's time for his chest...
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...she dumps the remaining water right in his face!
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(Somehow in the editing, the deluge that was hitting him around his chin in the wide shot has suddenly become a hose-like spout hitting him on his forehead in close-up!)
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Whatever the case, he's been properly doused.
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As he begins to open his eyes to look at Paraluman...
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...she's got other ideas of where to look entirely!
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This is his startled expression when he realizes she is checking him out! I thought this bit was rather daring for 1959, though - as I mentioned - the overall effect of it was spoiled somewhat when the cameraman caught the fact that he had clothing on...
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Another surprising thing to me was that this was the story of a real colonel and that man was a consultant on the film (and did have a hairline similar to Andes.) Did the real Donald Blackburn mind it or like it that during the ordeal in which he won a Silver Star, he's constantly seen dipping his wick into various island females!
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After the fateful day at the bath shack, Paraluman and Andes are no longer antagonistic to one another. They now enjoy picnics and other interludes.
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Now, she likes what she sees.
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There's still a war on, though, so the two participate in rebel activity, conspiring to destroy a bridge that he Japanese are hastily putting together. But then comes a most unusual wrinkle.
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In Andes' continued attempts to form a combat unit to overthrow the invading Japanese, he ultimately heads to the mountains and meets with tribes of HEADHUNTERS! (Cue the jungle music from Gilligan's Island!) This is not some screenwriter's flight of fancy. The real Blackburn truly did recruit such tribes when earning his medal.
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It was most unusual to watch a 1950s war flick in which many of the extras had large portions of their behind visible.
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By this point, the 1:25 low-budget oddity had utterly met and exceeded any curiosity value I'd had concerning it. Between the beefcake of Andes, the romantic elements, the scenery and now loincloth-garbed soldiers, I could find precious little with which to criticize the movie. Should you want to give it a whirl, it is free with ads on Tubi.
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This was my first encounter with Paraluman. She might not trip off the tongue of every American film viewer, but she enjoyed a 45-year movie career as the "Greta Garbo of the Philippines." Along the way, as it was in this case, she'd make an appearance in a U.S. film that was being shot in her country.
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Watching her in Surrender - Hell, I didn't see much Garbo in her, but at various times she reminded me of Claudette Colbert, Dolores Del Rio and even Lilli Palmer. She was of German and Filipino heritage. She died in 2009 from cardiac arrest at the age of 85
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This was Cabot's final film. She soon set in motion a series of crazed events that were almost as jaw-dropping as some of her movies. It started with a passionate fling with the King of Jordan (reportedly instigated by the CIA!), an illegitimate son with mental and physical disabilities and, ultimately, her murder at the hands of that grown son. She was 59 when he bludgeoned her to death in 1986.
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As for Andes, I have to say that he's not exactly my usual type, but at the same time I found him strangely captivating. Possessed of a sonorous voice, he'd been acting on radio since age 12! While serving in the U.S. Air Force during WWII, he participated in a stage show which was later made into a movie Winged Victory (1944), and he was given a small role in it. After the war, he seriously attempted a movie career. (Perhaps you recall him in 1947's The Farmer's Daughter, alongside "brothers" James Arness and Lex Barker?!)
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His big break came in 1952 when he got to canoodle with Marilyn Monroe in Clash By Night. (It was presumably in the rather lean years between that Andes posed for the nude figure photos that still circulate on the Internet.)
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His character was pretty brutish in that one and here he's seen with a towel around Marilyn's throat!
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I had to include this amusing shot of Andes practicing on the movie's director Fritz Lang. (There were surely a few people jealous of this moment, Lang having been quite the tyrannical director at various stages of his career!)
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Andes was employed regularly thereafter, in Blackbeard the Pirate (1952), Back From Eternity (1956) and The Girl Most Likely (1957), among others, though he was never part of a huge breakout hit or well-regarded classic.
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Aging into character roles, he was on most of the hit TV series of the 1960s (including Star Trek, in which he was still sporting an impressive physique) as well as some in the 1970s. He also has the distinction of having been Lucille Ball's leading man in her Broadway foray Wildcat. Andes worked on screen until 1980, but ultimately preferred life as a successful charter boat captain. However, a very painful bout of bladder cancer later led to him committing suicide by hanging in 2005 at age 85, when the agony of the disease became unbearable.
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The End.
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