The Court-Martial Of Billy Mitchell 1955 DvdRip Avi Lee1001

The Court-Martial Of Billy Mitchell 1955 DvdRip Avi Lee1001



http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047956/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Court-Martial_of_Billy_Mitchell

Real-life military courtroom drama starring Gary Cooper and Rod Steiger, and directed by Otto Preminger.



Otto Preminger means different things to different people. To many, he's one of the great émigré directors of the 1940s and 1950s. To others he's a flamboyant movie producer. And then there's that small group to whom the Austrian-born polymath will always be the camper-than-camp Mr Freeze in the Adam West 'Batman' TV series.



Amongst the many titles he's been given, it's undisputed master of the courtroom drama that sits best upon Preminger's broad shoulders. Such was his skill in this arena, you could almost say his reputation was secured by one picture - the immaculate Anatomy Of A Murder. However, if further proof was needed, look no further than The Court-Martial Of Billy Mitchell, an extraordinary true life drama that proves that Preminger was the king of the courts long before he encountered James Stewart.



Preminger's superb if somewhat underrated picture tells the story of General Billy Mitchell (Gary Cooper). An especially courageous man, Mitchell had enjoyed considerable success as a fighter pilot during World War I. In spite of this, he found that the military were unwilling to consider an air force as fundamental to battlefield success as the army and navy. Incensed, Mitchell (who was so far seeing as to predict a Japanese attack on American soil) found himself in court accused of questioning the loyalty of his fellow officers.



Mitchell's time in the dock produces all manner of remarkable drama. Admittedly Gary Cooper is no more expressive here than he is in most of his most of his other movies, but thanks to Preminger's confident hand and the presence of the larger-than-life Rod Steiger on the prosecution bench, The Court-Martial Of Billy Mitchell is up there with genre classics such as The Verdict and Presumed Innocent.



And thanks to Preminger's eye for detail, there are also plenty of delights to be found on the fringes of the screen. So be sure to look out for a fine supporting turn for Jack Lord of 'Hawaii 5-0' , some great throwaway dialogue (much of it courtesy of an uncredited Ben Hecht and Dalton Trumbo) and a typically irascible turn from grouch for hire Ralph Bellamy



The Criterion's new film, "The Court-Martial of Billy Mitchell," is precisely what its title says. It is a movie version of the military trial of the famous general, "Billy" Mitchell, held in Washington in 1925.



General Mitchell was tried for publicly charging the Army and the Navy with "incompetence, criminal negligence and almost treasonable administration" because they were, to his mind, too slow in recognizing and building up air power after World War I.



As one might expect, this motion picture stacks the cards in every way in favor of its earnest hero, whom Gary Cooper plays. It shows him as a stout but courteous champion of the military potential of the airplane in his early encounters with Army "brass hats" who are invariably shown as stubborn martinets. It implies that his famous berating of the War Department occurred only after his good friend Commander Lansdowne of the dirigible Shenandoah was killed. And it suggests that his ultimate conviction of insubordination came about more through the cleverness of a tricky lawyer than through the application of pure justice by the military court.



In short, this personalized drama — which Milton Sperling has produced, with Otto Preminger directing for Warners in color and CinemaScope—plays entirely upon the current sentiment that General Mitchell was a chivalrous martyr to an obvious cause. And it clearly implies that the desperate tactic he used to gain the public's ear was justified.



As an item of entertainment, it is most fascinating when the trial is re-enacted (with some license) and Mr. Cooper is called upon to spar with Rod Steiger as the prosecuting lawyer who rather brutally breaks him down. Since both men are expert actors and the court material is good, the tension is electrifying and the emotions crack in this scene.



VIDEO

Size.... 1.36gb

Duration.... 01:40:39

Codec.... divx

Frame Width..... 1280

Frame Height.... 502

Data Rate.... 1810kbps

Frame Rate.... 24 F/S

AUDIO

Bit Rate.... 128kbps

2 Channel Stereo

Audio Sample Rate.... 44KHz

Bits Per Sample 16 Bit/Sample