Canal Zone

This film is extremely boring. If I give it 3 stars it is for the special effects (no credit is given) and the use of model airplanes. But the rest is routine, and a bit on the absurd side. A retired American officer is running a camp where men are trained to fight as bomber pilots during II World War, somewhere in the Panama Canal Zone, close enough to the capital city (where they seldom go, only one scene that could happen anywhere) and far away from US military bases, losing the opportunity to add some tension about the war going on and how the Canal could be affected. The central drama is the taming of a rich and spoiled recruit (John Hubbard) by a poor but tough all-American trainer (Chester Morris), and both are attracted to the only woman around (Harriet Hilliard), who happens to be the boring daughter of the boss, so she always manages to be present everywhere. The rest of the plot you have seen it many times before, betraying the enthusiasm of a few of the players: Hubbard, Larry Parks, Lloyd Bridges, Louis Jean Heydt and especially old pro George McKay. I saw this one while doing some research for a friend's book about foreign films made in or about Panama. Produced by Columbia Pictures, this is infinitely less interesting than movies made by "poverty row" studios as PRC-Producers Releasing Corporation ("South of Panama") and GNP-Grand National Pictures ("Panama Patrol"), or others produced with more zest, as Fox's "Marie Galante" and "Charlie Chan in Panama".