5/10
"Your Uncle Sam is a better man than their old Uncle Joe"
13 March 2015
The only big screen film that dealt directly with Ronald Reagan's anti- Communism was this film made post Korean War in 1954. By that time tales of North Korean atrocities were pretty widely known and at least the subject matter of Prisoner of War was generally accepted. As to how well done this film is another matter.

It's a bottom billed B picture where Ronald Reagan is given an assignment to actually infiltrate a prisoner of war camp in North Korea to see if the rumors of atrocities are true. His fellow prisoners are cross section of the American GI and as Reagan says they all have a breaking point. Toughest of the lot is Steve Forrest, easiest is Dewey Martin in their hut.

Oscar Homolka is a strutting Russian colonel is an 'advisor' to the North Korean commander. No doubt he studied the techniques of Dr. Mengele from the last war and he's experimenting on the men the way Dr. Pavlov did with lab rats. He does find out in an unexpected way just where some people's breaking points are.

With some better writing and directing and production values this could have been a classic like that other Prisoner Of War film released by Paramount the year before, Stalag 17. But MGM wasn't too heavily invested in this one as you can plainly tell by watching.
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