vitaleralphlouis I never heard of this movie until I spotted the title via a CECIL B de MILLE search on this site yesterday. DeMILLE made few movies in the 1940's and 1950's and this was the only one I hadn't seen.Two years in production, this dreadfully-dull-titled movie is a big screen epic Technicolor production depicts a seemingly small act of heroism --- a Navy doctor from Arkansas rescues 12 survivors of the USS Marblehead who are trapped on Java with the Japanese closing in on all sides, during the early part of World War II when America was still losing badly. DeMille brings the story together with a first rate mix of spectacular action, human drama, romance, and typical GI humor.This is a REAL World War II movie, made during an era when Hollywood had neither Sean Penn, nor George Clooney, nor Steven Spielberg; and all of Hollywood was solidly behind America (not Japan)--- this era produced numerous real life war heroes who were also screen actors, directors, writers. More recently we have the revisionist history guys, such as Jerry Bruckheimer's PEARL HARBOR which "justified" the attack by the Japanese for the clearly stated reason of grabbing up bigger Japanese box office. Like most Americans (I think) I'd never have seen that movie if I'd known they'd stick a knife in the back of America and re-write the war against us.Warning to girlie-man liberals: Dr Wassell is loaded with 2007-style Political Incorrectness. The GI's flirt with nurses, smoke cigarettes like mad, call their cigarettes "fags," call the Japanese enemy Japs; worse still they reflect patriotic attitudes and carry religion so far as to pray. Ohmygawd! This movie is difficult but not impossible to find. It was released by MCA/Universal in VHS many years ago. Specialty video shops like Video Vault in Alexandria, VA have it for rent. No listings on eBay right now, but it's worth a shot. Seek and you shall find!

blanche-2 Gary Cooper has the title role in "The Story of Dr. Wassell," a fact-based 1944 film directed by Cecil B. DeMille and also starring Laraine Day, Dennis O'Keefe, Signe Hasso, and Elliott Reid. During World War II, a naval doctor tries to evacuate soldiers from the East Indies as the Japanese are approaching. He insists upon taking the wounded on a transport ship, the Pecos, even though it is against orders. In the end, he is not able to do it. Wassell stays with his soldiers, all of whom assume they will die on Java. But the doctor won't give up. Along the way, we learn of his life in China and the woman (Day) that he loved."The Story of Dr. Wassell" is a little long and gets off to a slow start, but holds up thanks to Gary Cooper and the audience's involvement with some of the well-drawn supporting characters. By the time the movie is over, you feel like you've been in the war with them. I'm not sure if that's due to the length of the film or what the soldiers went through.Cooper was about 43 years old when this film was made, yet he still retained that boyish smile of his. I've never figured out if he was a great actor or not; he was so outrageously handsome, I just can't stop staring at him. He didn't have James Stewart's range, Bogart's timing or Wayne's biting voice, but there was something very solid about him, as well as virile, likable, and magnetic. He also has a no-nonsense way of portraying a character, kind of cutting to the chase, and his performance really carries this film. Laraine Day doesn't have a very big role - in fact, she's wasted. The movie does provide a showy role for Dennis O'Keefe (who replaced Alan Ladd) and Signe Hasso, a very good actress often relegated to B films. O'Keefe plays a wounded soldier named Hoppy - and if you see this film, don't turn it off when you see "The End" because Mr. DeMille actually has an update about him.The script could have been tighter, but "The Story of Dr. Wassell" is good entertainment, maybe a little dated, but nevertheless the story of a real-life hero who deservedly won the Purple Heart.

scottblaze With at least a little historical correctness, in it's time, the silly and jerky script was probably well worth the price of admission. If you are a fan of "classic" movies, Gary Cooper for the most part in this presentation is worth suffering through the balance of mindless drivel that appears to be little more than filler needed to make a 137 minute movie. Whew!!!... Dutch nurses with tight tops and well exposed cleavages are entertaining to say the least, but was that stuff historically correct? Was there a beauty shop at every corner?....Even n the jungle? It would be nice if so, but given the times, that sort of expose' seems unlikely. The men, with the exception of Cory Wassell, are depicted as nasty, dirty, uneducated, ignorant but highly patriotic pawns in a war of of someone else's doing's.Watch this movie, just don't expect greatness in any way shape form or fashion. Is it worth repeating?....maybe not.

Robert J. Maxwell This is a good role for Gary Cooper. He's tall, sun-tanned, speaks with what is supposed to be an Arkansas accent although it doesn't approach the saturation level of his Sergeant York, and is a humanitarian doctor with an inventive streak. He's also nattily dressed, but that's hardly worth mentioning since just about everyone in the movie is dressed in clean, pressed clothes. Combat has no effect on their grooming.Basically, Dr. Wassell, formerly an investigator of snail-vectored diseases in China, joins the Navy and is voluntarily left behind with a few nurses and a dozen or so patients too disabled to walk about the last ship departing the island of Java, threatened by the Japanese in 1941.The wounded are all sailors from the USS Marblehead and Houston, which were sunk in the battle of the Java Sea. The Japanese blew the American-British-Dutch-Australian force out of the water. That is to say, we lost, which is to say you will see multiple movies about the battle of Midway (we won) but absolutely none about the battle of the Java Sea.There are two scenes of violence. In the first, the hospital housing the wounded is bombed by Japanese planes. It's quite well handled. The ordinary war flick of the time would have multiple bombs falling at once, lots of outdoor models with paper-machie palms trees doing flips, and heroic Allies pumping machine guns up in the air. But DeMille doesn't do it that way. Everything is seen from inside a single hospital ward, the men and staff hiding under mattresses. There are only three or four bombs, with intervals between them, and they're nothing more than a long and eerie whistle before they hit. The first lands far away. The second and third are more of a jolt, and the last one blows in the windows, upends some of the hospital beds, and kills a patient. Instead of mindless action we get a scene full of suspense.The middle part of the movie involves a long and painful journey by trucks and other British vehicles across Java to another port. One man -- and his devoted native girlfriend -- run off the road in their jeep and find themselves surrounded by Japanese soldiers. "They no take prisoners -- in jungle." "I got an idea. Hand me that Tommy gun," he tells her, eyes blazing, and there is a fade out on Hoppy spraying lead around in the general direction of the camera. Sure, it's a cliché, but again DeMille spares us the shots of a thousand barbaric monkeys tumbling over as they charge the doomed couple.Gary Cooper, as I say, is neat. He manages to save the remaining wounded and link up again with his lost love, Lorraine Day. He's awarded the Navy Cross (I think) for his efforts.A long movie, but not a bad one for its time.