Review of Assault on a Queen (1966) by Gordon W — 27 Jan 2011

Assault on a Queen (1966).

This is one of those typical mens adventures that you would find in a pulp fiction magazine. The screenplay for this was done by none other than Rod Serling from a novel by Jack Finney who's famous for writing Invasion of the Body Snatchers and Good Neighbor Sam. It was directed by Jack Donohue who had directed Frank Sinatra in his earlier television shows.

Sinatra plays Mark Brittain, a down-on-his-luck fishing boat captain, along the same lines as Bogart in his movie, "To Have and Have Not". Yes, he even has a black, alcholic side-kick, Linc Langley (Errol John).

Then, Vic Rossiter (Anthony Franciosa), Eric Lauffnauer (Alf Kjellin) and Rosa Luccesi (Virna Lisi) show up and offer him a job diving for sunken treasure. Mark doesn't find any ancient ship wrecks, but he does find a sunken U-Boat. Eric used to captain a U-Boat during the war and has this idea of raising the boat.

They miraculously raise the sub, take off 20 years barnacles and rust, and get it running again, not with the idea of selling it to a maritime museum for a bucket of cash, but to use it to rob the Queen Mary.

Mark isn't very interested in getting into the piracy game, but he is attracted to Rosa's long legs and beautiful face. Admittedly, this is what keeps us watching this slow moving caper movie too. Rosa seems to be attracted to Mark, but we don't know if it's just to keep dragging him into this caper or not.

There's more holes in this story than in a sea sponge, but we just feel compelled to ride it out and see what happens. Anthony Franciosa is great as the evil Vic Rossiter who can't seem to stop admiring other people's jewels.