Customer Reviews

Ice Cold in Alex ( Desert Attack ) [ NON-USA FORMAT, PAL, Reg.2 Import - United Kingdom ]

5 star:		(2)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Saw this movie only once but remember it rather vividly. It is a classic film of man vs. nature set in Northern Africa during the Second World War. The struggle between man and nature is epic and the acting is done in the classic british style of the 1950's. On the lines of Alec Guinness and the like. Nevertheless one waits for the classic ending scene. Unfortunately watching this movie in the US would be a struggle for anyone who is not dedicated. Kudos for anyone who actually reads this review.

Not just used for the Carlsberg beer advert (which is actually a scene directly from the movie!!! Fancy that!!) this movie captures everything you want in a Brit War flick -- Brit soldiers who know about trucks, nurses, double agents and Rommel-type German soldiers, death, love and stirring music that makes you feel very patriotic. Ice Cold in Alex is a quintessential psychological thriller part action/drama, part chickflick with timeless social issues addressed (namely alcoholism and espionage)all rolled into a Good vs Bad with a twist adventure.

Without giving away the plot the setting is the 1942 Libyan war zone. Sir John Mills is a British ambulance officer who together with his sergeant major driver and nurse (the love interest - Sylvia Sims) escape the German's seige of Tobruk and drive across the hot Western Desert in an ambulance. In a race against time and the elements of the desert the objective is to get to the safety of Alexandria to meet up with the allies and,in true British fashion, have an "ice cold" beer at this little bar!!! The gang get waylaid by Germans who tradeoff a South African officer (Anthony Quayle) for the trip (could he be a spy?) After getting into a couple of scrapes and tight spots along the way all ends well for the group, or does it . . . well, you'll just have to watch the ending for yourselves.

Ice Cold in Alex is a brilliant WWII movie - a classic and my own all time fav - definitely a movie worth having in your collection.

NOTE: Check out Amazon.co.uk. You can get this movie for about 4 quid but it'll be in PAL format not NTSC -- Hey, so watch it on your computer!!! It's worth it!

This film is about a small group of people who try to get back to Alexandria after being cut off by german desert troop advances in world war II. It features a group of very different people thrown together through accidents of war. They are two nurses, a drunken commander and his side-kick. Later on a south african engineer joins thems and helps them out of some serious trouble a number of times. However is the south african all he says to be?

Sylvia Syms is the surviving nurse and looks fabulous even though she's in a desert with little water.

It appears there are a number of scenes that were single takes. One classic is when they are trying to push an ambulance up a sand dune. Sylvia slips and the drunk helps her up and attempts to help her back to the ambulance. However they get their timing wrong and the guy accidently slams her head into the rear door of the ambulance! Sylvia recoils and briefly holds her head but then remembers that this is a single take and gets back to pushing.

It is obvious that she really did have her head pounded into the door and she wasn't acting!

The film has nice depth to it with a good twist and resolution at the end. A good example of an english war film.

Four people in an ambulance are struggling to cross the hot, blinding North African desert on their way from Tobruk to Alexandria. It's 1942 and Rommel's Africa Corps is just about to take Tobruk and continue its race to Egypt. There is Captain Anson (a blond John Mills), an ambulance officer stressed to the breaking point and just this shy of being an alcoholic; Sergeant Major Tom Pugh (Harry Andrews), a big, capable lifer who has been with Anson for several months and knows his weaknesses; Diana Murdoch (Sylvia Syms), a nurse who was stranded in Tobruk, who has a steady hand but has seen her friend, another nurse, die in an attack on the ambulance; and Captain van der Poel (Anthony Quayle), a strong, swaggering South African they meet in a deserted outpost. Captain Anson is persuaded to let van der Poel join them because van der Poel has three bottles of gin with him. He also carries something in a knapsack he refuses to let out of his sight.

Ice Cold in Alex is one of the best of the war movies Britain produced in the Fifties. It sets up a small group of people on a tense journey through a desolate landscape in a broken-down ambulance. We get to know these people...and we begin to worry whether Captain Anson is going to lose it every time he gets close to a bottle; whether van der Poel is truly a South African or a German spy; whether it will be Sergeant Pugh, or Nurse Syms, or van der Poel who'll get killed in one of the dangerous situations they encounter. And the movie has plenty of well-directed, tense situations coming one after the other. The four of them encounter mine fields that must be crossed, sand storms, Nazi ambushes and pursuits, capture by German troops they must talk their way out of (with van der Poel coming in handy), mechanical breakdowns and quicksand. And if there is one lesson they all learn, it's to never park your vehicle on the top of a giant sand dune.

The movie is unusual in that the hero is damaged goods. John Mills is excellent in portraying Captain Anson as a determined and stalwart British officer. He's even better at showing this man just a bit too eager for a drink, too quick to justify it, too close to breaking down when things don't work out. Mills was not a big man, and he has to dominate the movie next to two very big men, Harry Andrews and Anthony Quayle. Both are nearly a head taller than Mills. In one scene Mills as Anson collapses and Quayle must pick him up, carry him several steps to the rear of the ambulance and deposit him inside. This is all done in one shot. Quayle looks as if he's dealing with no more than a 50 pound bag of flour, yet Mills is definitely the one we watch during the movie. His Captain Anson may be falling apart, but he is determined to get the ambulance and its passengers to Alexandria. While he struggles to do so we can see that he's slowing pulling himself together. It's a nice performance. There also is almost no distraction from artificial romance. There is only the faintest hint of a possible relationship developing between Nurse Murdoch and Captain Anson, just a brief moonlight nuzzle and, much later, a realistic recognition of Anson's continuing demons and the difficulty of making personal plans in wartime. The movie also gives a much more subtle approach to the German enemy. At the conclusion, while the four of them are finally enjoying an ice-cold lager in an Alexandrian bar, one of them points out that, working together, they beat the desert, which was a bigger enemy than...well, you'll need to see the movie.

For those who like well-constructed films that don't let up, who like good performances and who like older British films, Ice Cold in Alex is worth having. The Region Two DVD transfer is just fine. There are no extras.

This is an excellent WW2 war movie set in the Western Desert of North Africa. It is the story of a group of British soldiers who must outwit the German Army and survive the desert in an attempt to return to British lines. One of the party is a German officer who is eventually found out. To survive the desert they all must pull together. Upon arrival in Egypt they have "An Ice Cold" beer "In ALEX" (Alexandria, Egypt). CAUTION....will not play on USA players....hopefully it will be released in NTSC and Region 1 format in the near future. It is a very good film of desert survival and honor between enemies.....also released under the title "ICE COLD IN ALEX"...

When the movie was first shown in Hong Kong in the late fifties,
it received very good review.
My father used to like this type of film and he took me to see it
in the cinema.
All I could remember was all these sand and the last vivid sequence
in a bar in Alexandria, Egypt.
I bought a PAL version of the dvd from Amazon.UK and watched
it recently.

It was an early film directed by Lee J. Thompson who later directed
"Guns of Navarone" and many other Hollywood hits.
It was release in the US under the name of "Desert Attack", such a
dreadful name.

Watching it now, the film doesn't age a bit.
It remains a very well-made WWII movie from a novel with John Mills
played a troubled officer, Harry Andrew as his dependable fellow soldier,
lovely Sylvia Syms as a nurse who came along for the ride
and Anthony Quayle as a mysterious South African the group met in the desert.

The film is obviously made with a low budget but the sequence with the group
trying to drag the truck over the sand dune recalls Werner Herzog's
efforts in dragging the boat over the hill in "Fitzcarraldo".

The final scene with the group's downing the ice cold Carlsberg in the bar in Alex
after their arduous track in the desert still holds up and finishing off
with a satisfying ending afterwards.
Almost a flawless film, if you count there's no frost on the beer glasses.

Ice Cold in Alex is a reference to a cold beer at the journeys end through the hostile desert of North Africa, Alex being Alexandria. The beer is actually a Carlsberg, interesting since the movie is British. The film is a journey style story where a group of unlikely people join together in a perilious journey and come to rely on each other even when one is suspected to be an enemy spy.

What sets it apart and allows it to age well is the strong preformances of all the lead actors and presence of the Desert itself to the point where going to get a cold beer as a viewer seems to be a good idea.

Some of it has been done better at a later date, like the desert scenes in Lawerence of Arabia and the English Patient. But here the closer and smaller group add a sense of humanity that the other epic movies lose in scale and therefore the film ages well.

So if you are the type that appreciates this type of old b/w movies then this one is for you. If you are not, well give it a miss but you are missing out on one of the better such movies.

If you do watch it, keep a cold Carlsberg in the fridge. You will be wanting it :)

Great Movie, Great actors,
They don't make them like this anymore more's the pity!
If you want a v/good war story then this is it.
Highly recommended.

Watch out.This product is NOT COMPATIBLE with north american
dvd players.It is ONLY suitable for region 2.
Even if it is advertised on a north american website (U.S/CANADA),some not so bright individual "forgot" to have it encoded for region 1 for export purposes.
You will waste time and money and end up with a useless product
unable to enjoy it,and in this case also review it.
All you will get is a ERROR display on your dvd player.

Hopefully some day this otherwise fine war movie will be available locally in region 1 format,then maybe i'll be able to review it.