Kings Go Forth (1958)

Frank Sinatra, Tony Curtis and Natalie Wood star in this searing war drama.
In WW II France, Corporal Britt Harris (Curtis) is assigned to work alongside war-weary Sgt. Loggins (Sinatra) - a man he soon rivals for the affections of the beautiful Monique Blair (Woods), an American who grew up in France.

Kings Go Forth is a 1958 black-and-white World War II film. The screenplay was written by Merle Miller from the novel of the same name by Joe David Brown, and the film was directed by Delmer Daves. The plot involves friends of different backgrounds manning an observation post in Southern France who fall in love with the same French girl. She proves to be of American mulatto ancestry. Themes of racism and miscegenation provide the conflict elements between the leading characters, something that was out of the ordinary for films of the time, while the setting during the so-called Champagne Campaign remains unique.

Of his role in Kings Go Forth, Tony Curtis said that it was the "most difficult" of his career, while Sinatra, despite his liberal credentials, said that he "took the part as a performer, not a lecturer on racial problems."

At the US box office, Kings Go Forth was a moderate hit that was received without great adulation from critics, but hardly lambasted.

 

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The Defiant Ones (1958)

Tony Curtis • Sidney Poitier

Two prisoners in the American South, African-American Noah Cullen (Poitier) and racist John "Joker" Jackson (Curtis), escape from a chain gang. Despite their mutual loathing for each other, they are forced to cooperate, as they are chained together. Gradually, they begin to respect and like each other.

Cullen and Joker flee through difficult terrain and weather, with a brief stop at a village where they attempt to break into a general store, in hopes of obtaining food and tools to break the chain that holds them together. Instead, however, they are captured by the townspeople, who form a lynch mob; they are saved only by the interference of "Big" Sam (Chaney), a man who is appalled by his neighbors' bloodthirst. Sam convinces the townspeople to lock the convicts up and turn them in in the morning, but that night, he secretly releases them, after revealing to them that he is also a former chain-gang prisoner.

Watch Movie - The Defiant Ones

 

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Houseboat (1958)

Houseboat is a 1958 romantic comedy film starring Cary Grant, Sophia Loren, Martha Hyer, Paul Petersen, Charles Herbert and Mimi Gibson. The movie was directed by Melville Shavelson, who also directed the original 1968 version of Yours, Mine and Ours.
Cary Grant plays a government attorney who can't seem to shake his bad fortune. Living on a houseboat, widowed and left with three unruly kids, he hires Sophia Loren as a governess. The magnetic Loren and the charming Grant add up a cheeky, urbane comedy.

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Tom Winters (Grant), has been separated from his wife for three years and their divorce is pending when she is killed in a car crash. He returns home from Europe to find his three children - David, Elizabeth, and Robert - in the care of his wife's family. The children's grandparents intend to raise Elizabeth, and Tom's sister-in-law Carolyn (Hyer) plans to take in David and Robert. The children wish to stay with their aunt and grandparents in the country, but Tom decides to take the children back home to Washington DC, where he works in the State Department.

The children resent their father's presence and, at an outdoor Watergate concert, Robert runs away. He is found by Cinzia Zaccardi (Loren), the daughter of a famous Italian conductor. She, too, is running away and is enchanted by little "Roberto" and his harmonica. When she brings him back home to Tom's apartment, he offers her a job as a maid, which she eventually accepts.

Carolyn, now recently divorced from her husband, offers Tom and the children her old guest house, which was supposed to be moved to a new foundation before the family arrives. However, while on the way to their new home, they encounter the house being towed down the road, and stop the driver, Angelo Donatello (Guardino). Angelo, distracted while staring at Cinzia, accidentally hits their parked car with his tow truck, and parks the house on a train track. While Angelo flirts with Cinzia and Tom checks the car for damage, both of them ignoring warnings from David (Petersen), an oncoming train smashes the traveling guest house. Angelo, feeling guilty, offers Tom his weekend home: a houseboat.

The houseboat is a leaky, dirty mess, but Tom decides to buy it from Angelo. Once moved in, Tom discovers that Cinzia is unable to cook, do laundry or make "American coffee". Upon learning this, Carolyn and others mock Cinzia and her role in the household. However, Cinzia is able to befriend David, who complains that his father treats him like a "lame brain", and convince Elizabeth that her father loves her. The entire family becomes very fond of Cinzia.

Meanwhile, Tom is spending evenings at the country club with Carolyn, who has harbored a secret crush on him her entire life. She helps Tom buy a gaudy gold dress for Cinzia, for her date with Angelo. Cinzia, who at first believes she's being asked on a date with Tom, transforms the dress into a gorgeous gown, stunning both Angelo and Tom. Angelo, frightened at how beautiful and classy she looks, cancels the date.



Carolyn arrives at the boat with Captain Alan Wilson (Murray Hamilton) and his wife. Alan, who has already had quite a few drinks, jokes about Cinzia's suspicious living arrangement with Tom, and slaps her on the behind as she serves drinks. She throws a drink on him in retaliation. Tom asks Alan to leave the boat, but Carolyn takes Alan's side, so Tom asks all three of the guests to leave.



David cheers Cinzia up, and they make plans to go fishing, but Tom ruins his son's plans by asking Cinzia to the country club. Once there, Tom reconciles with Carolyn and they agree to get married, but when Tom starts to tell Cinzia the news, he realizes he is in love with her. When Alan congratulates Tom for proposing to Carolyn, Cinzia gets upset and runs away, but Tom catches her, and a little while later, David unhappily finds them kissing in a rowboat.

The children don't want Cinzia to marry their father. David calls Cinzia ugly, Robert rejects her as his mother, and Elizabeth wants to continue sleeping in the same bed as her father. Discouraged by this, Cinzia returns home to her father (Cianelli). But Tom comes after her, and her father convinces them to get married because they love each other.

The wedding takes place on the houseboat. At first, the children refuse to participate in the ceremony, even though their father pleads with them. However, as the ceremony begins, Elizabeth and David join Tom and Cinzia at the altar, and Robert plays "Here Comes the Bride" on his harmonica before joining his new family.

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