''The Sergeant'' is a 1968 American

drama film In film and television, drama is a category or genre of narrative fiction (or semi-fiction) intended to be more serious than humorous in tone. Drama of this kind is usually qualified with additional terms that specify its particular super ...

directed by John Flynn and starring Rod Steiger and

John Phillip Law John Phillip Law (September 7, 1937 – May 13, 2008) was an American film actor. Following a breakthrough role as a Russian sailor in ''The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming'' (1966), Law became best known for his roles as gu ...

. It was released by

Warner Bros.-Seven Arts Warner Bros.-Seven Arts, Inc. was a short-lived American entertainment company active from 1967 until 1969. History Seven Arts Productions acquired Jack L. Warner's controlling interest in Warner Bros. Pictures for $32 million in November 19 ...

Plot

A dedicated, decorated war veteran, Master Sergeant Callan, is posted in France at a fuel supply depot in 1952. Finding a lack of discipline under the frequently drunk Capt. Loring, he takes charge in a tough, no-nonsense manner. But distracting the sergeant is a physical attraction to one of his men, Private First Class Thomas Swanson, that seems at odds with everything in Callan's personality. He makes Swanson his orderly and befriends him socially, but behind his back scares off Solange, the private's girlfriend. Callan's confusion and depression grows and he begins to drink. Unable to resist the urge, the sergeant attempts to kiss Swanson and is violently warded off. He turns up for morning formation hungover and Loring relieves him of duty. Callan goes off to a nearby woods alone, rifle in hand, and commits suicide.

Cast

* Rod Steiger as MSgt. Albert Callan *

as Pfc. Tom Swanson *

Ludmila Mikaël Ludmila Mikaël (born 27 April 1947) is a French actress. She has appeared in more than eighty films since 1967. Selected filmography References External links * {{DEFAULTSORT:Mikael, Ludmila 1947 births Living people French fi ...

as Solange *

Frank Latimore Franklin Latimore (born Franklin Latimore Kline, September 28, 1925 – November 29, 1998) was an American actor. Life and career Latimore was born in Darien, Connecticut. He came from a well-to-do family, and was able to trace his lineage ba ...

as Capt. Loring *

Elliott Sullivan Elliott Sullivan (July 4, 1907 – June 2, 1974) was an American actor. Sullivan was born in San Antonio, Texas, the son of Rabbi Solomon Solomon. He appeared in the films ''They Won't Forget'', '' Over the Wall'', ''Accidents Will Happen'', ' ...

as Pop Henneken

Production

In 1966,

Robert Wise Robert Earl Wise (September 10, 1914 – September 14, 2005) was an American film director, producer, and editor. He won the Academy Awards for Best Director and Best Picture for his musical films ''West Side Story'' (1961) and ''The Sound of ...

set up a company to produce low-budget films that others would direct. He optioned Dennis Murphy's novel ''The Sergeant'' and hired his former assistant, John Flynn, to direct. Flynn says

Simon Oakland Simon Oakland (August 28, 1915 – August 29, 1983) was an American actor of stage, screen, and television. During his career, Oakland performed primarily on television, appearing in over 130 series and made-for-television movies between ...

badly wanted to play the lead, but so did Rod Steiger, who was in much demand at the time, and Steiger played it for less than his usual fee.

Reception

review aggregator A review aggregator is a system that collects reviews of products and services (such as films, books, video games, software, hardware, and cars). This system stores the reviews and uses them for purposes such as supporting a website where users ...

website

Rotten Tomatoes Rotten Tomatoes is an American review-aggregation website for film and television. The company was launched in August 1998 by three undergraduate students at the University of California, Berkeley: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang ...

, the film has a 20% approval rank based on 5 reviews.

Vincent Canby Vincent Canby (July 27, 1924 – October 15, 2000) was an American film and theatre critic who served as the chief film critic for ''The New York Times'' from 1969 until the early 1990s, then its chief theatre critic from 1994 until his death in ...

of ''

The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

'' called ''The Sergeant'' a "worth seeing

ilm Ilm or ILM may refer to: Acronyms * Identity Lifecycle Manager, a Microsoft Server Product * '' I Love Money,'' a TV show on VH1 * Independent Loading Mechanism, a mounting system for CPU sockets * Industrial Light & Magic, an American motion ...

, adding to it that "even when you're running ahead of it, anticipating its crises and climaxes as if they were stops on the BMT".

Legacy

The film was excerpted in the

documentary film A documentary film or documentary is a non-fictional motion-picture intended to "document reality, primarily for the purposes of instruction, education or maintaining a historical record". Bill Nichols has characterized the documentary in te ...

The Celluloid Closet ''The Celluloid Closet'' is a 1995 American documentary film directed and written by Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman. The film is based on Vito Russo's 1981 book ''The Celluloid Closet: Homosexuality in the Movies'', and on lecture and film clip ...

'' (1996).

References

External links

''The Sergeant'' at IMDB''The Sergeant'' at TCM Database
1968 directorial debut films 1968 drama films 1968 LGBT-related films American drama films American LGBT-related films Films about sexual repression Films about the United States Army Films based on American novels Films directed by John Flynn Films set in 1952 Films set in Paris LGBT-related drama films Warner Bros. films 1960s English-language films 1960s American films {{LGBT-drama-film-stub