Back Door to Hell
Back Door to Hell is a 1964 film concerning a three-man team of United States soldiers preparing the way for Gen. MacArthur's World War II return to the Philippines by destroying a Japanese communications center. It was produced on a relatively small budget and received lukewarm reviews.
Back Door to Hell | |
---|---|
Directed by | Monte Hellman |
Produced by | Fred Roos |
Screenplay by | John Hackett Richard A. Guttman |
Starring | Jimmie Rodgers John Hackett Jack Nicholson |
Music by | Mike Velarde |
Cinematography | Mars Rasca |
Edited by | Fely Crisostomo |
Production company | Lippert Pictures Medallion Films |
Distributed by | Twentieth Century-Fox |
Release date |
|
Running time | 75 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $80,000[1] |
John Hackett wrote the script on the boat from the US to the Philippines. Jack Nicholson was writing the script to Flight to Fury at the same time.[2]
Hellman, Nicholson and Hackett also made the film back to back with Flight to Fury (1964).[3]
Plot
Cast
- Jimmie Rodgers as Lt. Craig
- Jack Nicholson as Burnett
- John Hackett as Jersey
- Annabelle Huggins as Maria
- Conrad Maga as Paco
- Johnny Monteiro as Ramundo
- Joe Sison as Japanese Capt.
- Henry Duval as Garde
- Ben Perez
- Vic Uematsu
Production
Robert Lippert had been impressed by Jack Nicholson's Thunder Island so gave Nicholson and his friends Monte Hellman and John Hackett $160,000 and $400 a week salary to make two films on location in the Philippines. The three men and Hellman's wife and child travelled 28 days by ship via Hawaii, Hong Kong and Japan with the three working on the screenplays to both films on the voyage. Back Door to Hell was a rewrite on one of Lippert's existing screenplays.[4]
Popular singer Jimmie Rodgers had a substantial part in the film, and co-financed it.
The film, directed by Monte Hellman, was shot on location in the Philippines, giving it a particularly authentic look. The same plot was reused in Ib Melchior's Ambush Bay (1966) with a larger Marine patrol destroying a minefield prior to the American and Filipino invasion of the Philippines.
Notes
- McGilligan, Patrick (2015). Jack's Life: A Biography of Jack Nicholson (Updated and Expanded). W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 9780393350975.
- Stevens, Brad (2003). Monte Hellman: His Life and Films. McFarland. pp. 36–43. ISBN 9780786481880.
- Back from orient. (1965, Feb 12). Los Angeles Times (1923-Current File) Retrieved from https://search.proquest.com/docview/155116391
- McDougal, Dennis (2008). Five Easy Decades: How Jack Nicholson Became the Biggest Movie Star in Modern Times. John Wiley and Sons. p. 55. ISBN 9780471722465.
flight to fury.
External links
- Back Door to Hell on IMDb
- Back Door to Hell at the TCM Movie Database
- Back Door to Hell at AllMovie
- Back Door To Hell at the American Film Institute Catalog
- original film trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MhwQG--b_Uk