I'd have to say that this is a very interesting war time movie. It focuses on not the battle front, but the people who were responsible for the supply line behind the battle front.

The soldiers who are mostly rejects from the battle front are assigned to the Red Ball Express the troops comprising 6000 trucks to bring food, ammunition, and fuel.

This is an innocent looking movie, but it taught me the most important lesson of my life. That everything moves on a commerce. That war is a commerce. It's the delivery of the goods to the points of consumption that is everything. Almost nothing else matters, because if soldiers and tanks didn't have ammo and gas, there's no action. Everything in this world is the same way.

This kind of organized mobility decides the outcome of the war. America had good commander to realize this, and tactical minds to put it into action. Nobody was named a hero, but Patton couldn't have done what he did without the Red Ball Express.

This makes the movie one of the most memorable of all war time movies. I really loved it.

"Red Ball Express" is a film about the truck drivers who worked tirelessly to bring supplies to the men on the front lines...in this case, Patton's quickly advancing column of tanks. It is an important job that somehow gets overlooked in documentaries and textbooks...though supply lines are a huge reason the Allies won WWII.

Jeff Chandler plays the lieutenant in charge of the unit and he has to deal with a lot of things...the safety of his men, a disloyal sergeant, a driving partner who thinks the Lieutenant doesn't like him and more. All of it is MILDLY interesting and nothing more. Not a bad war film....just one that isn't particularly memorable.

Copyright 8 April 1952 by Universal Pictures Co., Inc. New York opening at the Criterion: 29 May 1952. U.S. release: May 1952. U.K. release through General Film Distributors on the lower half of a double bill: 7 July 1952. Australian release: 3 October 1952. 7,505 feet. 83 minutes.

SYNOPSIS: "Red Ball Express" is a railroad term meaning top-priority freight. What we have here is a high-speed, non-stop trucking detail that carried supplies to Patton's tank corps in the drive across France in WW 2.

COMMENT: All the credits for this film are at the end, and it was with considerable surprise that I learned it was directed by hero- of-the-French-auteur set, Budd Boetticher. The completely nondescript directorial style with its continual falling back on uninspired close-ups would seem to betray the director as a dross- in-the-pan recruit from TV who, after this failure, had deservedly returned to the dregs of anonymity from which he came.

Yet the credits say the film was directed by Budd Boetticher. Well, that's a smack in the eye for the French critics, but I suppose they will still be able to find the film bursting with "significant themes". Yeah. It's got themes all right, and such themes — all of them straight from the Hollywood hoke factory. The lieutenant in charge of this squad is a real tough disciplinarian, see, but....

The sergeant hates this lieutenant because he thinks the lieutenant is a coward and left the sergeant's brother for dead, see, but what really happened was.... In any event, guess what happens at the climax? Blow me down if the sergeant is not involved in a similar accident, and this time the lieutenant... And then there's this Negro corporal who thinks the lieutenant is prejudiced against the black folks, whereas in actual fact.... And guess what happens when one of the trucks has a slight accident? There's this gorgeous French dish, see, who just happens to be standing right on that actual spot, way out in the middle of nowhere.... Yeah, this film has themes all right and for my money the French movie "critics" are welcome to every one of them.

Still, these "significant themes" are punctuated with a bit of action now and again. and the film has been produced on a surprisingly expansive budget, with a large cast of second-string players, some of whom are now quite well-known, though their admirers are not going to thank anyone for reviving these early efforts. Production credits are capable, but, aside from the fairly spectacular fire climax, undistinguished.

OTHER VIEWS: I wasn't very interested in "Red Ball Express". I liked Jeff Chandler, but not war films. My own experience of the war is still too recent for me. I don't want any more mud, filth and bloodshed. And I don't like to make a film where the lead character is not master of his own destiny. — Budd Boetticher (pronounced "Betty-kar").