Intramuros 1965

Title: Intramuros
EXTERNAL URL: IMDB | TMDB
Languages: English
Genres: Drama, War,
Runtime: 1:28:00 Hour
Cast: Jock Mahoney, Fernando Poe Jr., Michael Parsons
Directors: Gerardo de Leon, Eddie Romero
Rating: 5.1 (135 Votes)
Year: 1965
Summary: This gritty, atmospheric war movie dramatizes a chapter of World War II history in which 10,000 Japanese soldiers, fearing execution if they surrendered, disobeyed their own superiors' orders and barricaded themselves in Manila's Intramuros section along with a thousand or so unfortunate civilians. The walled city-within-the-city was built by Spanish colonialists from 1590 onward. Leading Allied forces trying to wear the trapped Axis troops' resistance down is Jock Mahoney as a gruff American officer carrying a big load of guilt from a prior operation gone wrong. Shot in impressive chiaroscuro-lit black-and-white on location, this was a fairly rare U.S. coproduction at the time, though the Philippines would shortly become a hub for English- language exploitation movies (with co-directors Eddie Romero and Gerardo de Leon among the busiest creators of features designed for both local and overseas audiences). WALLS OF HELL must have been a bittersweet project for de Leon: during WW2 he was forced to make propaganda films by Japanese occupiers even as he secretly worked against them in the underground resistance. - Dennis Harvey