''The Angry Hills'' is a 1959 American-British

war film War film is a film genre concerned with warfare, typically about navy, naval, air force, air, or army, land battles, with combat scenes central to the drama. It has been strongly associated with the 20th century. The fateful nature of battle s ...

directed by Robert Aldrich and starring

Robert Mitchum Robert Charles Durman Mitchum (August 6, 1917 – July 1, 1997) was an American actor. He rose to prominence with an Academy Award nomination for the Best Supporting Actor for ''The Story of G.I. Joe'' (1945), followed by his starring in ...

Stanley Baker Sir William Stanley Baker (28 February 192828 June 1976) was a Welsh actor and film producer. Known for his rugged appearance and intense, grounded screen persona, he was one of the top British male film stars of the late 1950s, and later a pro ...

and

Elisabeth Müller Elisabeth Müller (18 July 1926 – 11 December 2006) was a Swiss actress. Filmography References External links * 1926 births 2006 deaths Swiss film actresses 20th-century Swiss actresses Actors from Basel-Stadt {{Switzerlan ...

. It is based on the novel by

Leon Uris Leon Marcus Uris (August 3, 1924 – June 21, 2003) was an American author of historical fiction who wrote many bestselling books including ''Exodus'' (published in 1958) and ''Trinity'' (published in 1976). Life and career Uris was born in Bal ...

Plot

Set in Greece in 1941, before and after the Axis invasion, the film follows an American journalist who possesses a list of Greek resistance leaders. Having memorized the list he destroys it and is then pursued by various groups of people keen to have it: Communist resistance fighters, the Gestapo and Greek collaborators.

Cast

as Mike Morrison *

as Conrad Heisler *

as Lisa Kyriakides * Gia Scala as Eleftheria *

Theodore Bikel Theodore Meir Bikel ( ; May 2, 1924 – July 21, 2015) was an Austrian-American actor, folk singer, musician, composer, unionist, and political activist. He appeared in films, including '' The African Queen'' (1951), ''Moulin Rouge'' (1952), ' ...

as Dimitrios Tassos * Sebastian Cabot as Chesney *

Peter Illing Peter Illing (4 March 1899 – 29 October 1966) was an Austrian-born British film and television actor. Selected TV series * '' Deadline Midnight'' (1961) as Captain Dnieprovsky * '' The Saint'' (1962) as Inspector Buono Filmography * '' The S ...

as Leonides *

Leslie Phillips Leslie Samuel Phillips (20 April 1924 – 7 November 2022) was an English actor, director, producer and author. He achieved prominence in the 1950s, playing smooth, upper-class comic roles utilising his "Ding dong" and "Hello" catchphrases. ...

as Ray Taylor * Donald Wolfit as Dr. Stergion *

Marius Goring Marius Re Goring, (23 May 191230 September 1998) was a British stage and screen actor. He is best remembered for the four films he made with Powell & Pressburger, particularly as Conductor 71 in '' A Matter of Life and Death'' and as Julian Cr ...

as Colonel Elrick Oberg * Jocelyn Lane as Maria Tassos *

Kieron Moore Kieron Moore (born Ciarán Ó hAnnracháin, anglicised as Kieron O'Hanrahan) (5 October 1924 – 15 July 2007) was an Irish film and television actor whose career was at its peak in the 1950s and 1960s. He may be best remembered for his role as ...

as Andreas * George Pastell as Papa Panos *

Patrick Jordan Albert Patrick Jordan (10 October 1923 – 10 January 2020) was a British stage, film and television actor. Biography He was born and raised in Harrow, Middlesex, the son of Margaret, a cook, and Albert Jordan, a regimental sergeant major. An ...

as Bluey * Marita Constantinou as Cleopatra * Stanley Van Beers as Tavern Proprietor *

Alec Mango Alec Mango (16 March 1911 – 7 November 1989) was an English actor. He is best known for portraying El Supremo in the 1951 ''Captain Horatio Hornblower'', he also appeared in '' South of Algiers'' (1953), ''The Strange World of Planet X'' (195 ...

as Phillibos * Kostas Gousgounis as Agent(uncredited)

Production

Uris' novel was published in 1955. Because of its Greek setting, Uris was hired to write the screenplay for '' Boy on a Dolphin''. Film rights were bought by Raymond Stross in England, who said he wanted

Clark Gable William Clark Gable (February 1, 1901November 16, 1960) was an American film actor, often referred to as "The King of Hollywood". He had roles in more than 60 motion pictures in multiple genres during a career that lasted 37 years, three decades ...

for the lead. Stross eventually set up the film with MGM and New York's Cine World Productions, and announced

would star. According to Mitchum, Alan Ladd was meant to play the lead but the producers drove out to Ladd's house and met him after "he'd just crawled out of his swimming pool and was all shrunken up like a dishwasher's hand. They decided he wouldn't do for the big war correspondent. So, what happened? Some idiot said, 'Ask Mitchum to play it. That bum will do anything if he has five minutes free.' Well I had five minutes free so I did it." Pier Angeli was wanted for the female lead. Elizabeth Mueller was cast instead. Leon Uris did the first draft of the screenplay. However Aldrich had it rewritten by A.I. Bezzerides, who had written ''

Kiss Me Deadly ''Kiss Me Deadly'' is a 1955 American film noir produced and directed by Robert Aldrich, starring Ralph Meeker, Albert Dekker, Paul Stewart, Juano Hernandez, and Wesley Addy. It also features Maxine Cooper and Cloris Leachman appearing in th ...

'' for Aldrich. The film was shot from June to December 1958 with location shooting in Greece and interiors at MGM-British Studios.Alain Silver and James Ursini, ''Whatever Happened to Robert Aldrich?'', Limelight, 1995 p 251 Robert Aldrich had just made ''

Ten Seconds to Hell ''Ten Seconds To Hell'' (released in the UK as ''The Phoenix'') is a 1959 British and West German film directed by Robert Aldrich, based on Lawrence P. Bachmann's novel ''The Phoenix''. The Hammer Films/UFA joint production stars Jack Palance, ...

'' in Germany. He later recalled:

Box office

According to MGM records the film earned $510,000 in the US and Canada and $775,000 elsewhere, resulting in a loss of $497,000. It had admissions of 588,260 in France.French box office results for Robert Aldrich films
at Box Office Story

Legacy

Robert Aldrich later said the film was "disappointing not because it's not a good picture but because it could have been good. It had a potential that was never remotely realised... you feel sad about ''The Angry Hills''... I'd know how to make ''The Angry Hills'' better in a thousand ways."

References

External links

*
''The Angry Hills''
at

TCMDB Turner Classic Movies (TCM) is an American movie-oriented pay-TV network owned by Warner Bros. Discovery. Launched in 1994, Turner Classic Movies is headquartered at Turner's Techwood broadcasting campus in the Midtown business district of A ...

Review of film
in

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 ...

Review of film
at ''Variety'' {{DEFAULTSORT:Angry Hills 1959 films Films shot in Greece Films shot in Athens American World War II films American black-and-white films British World War II films British black-and-white films Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer films 1959 war films British war drama films American war drama films Films directed by Robert Aldrich Films scored by Richard Rodney Bennett Films set in Axis-occupied Greece Films shot at MGM-British Studios 1950s English-language films 1950s American films 1950s British films