Movie: Between Heaven and Hell (1956)
- Director: Richard Fleischer
- Release Date: 5 December 1956 (Japan)
- Writers: Harry Brown (screenplay) Francis Gwaltney (novel)
- Run Time: 94 min
- Country: USA
- Genre: Drama , War
Tagline: From the best-selling novel of young love in war!
Trivia: When studio Twentieth Century-Fox bought the rights to the Francis Gwaltney novel The Day the Century Ended, they contracted "The Twilight Zone" (1959) television-playwright and Philippines war veteran Rod Serling to write the film script. In World War II, Serling was a member of the 511th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the 11th Airborne Division. However, Serling’s draft script was too long and was rejected. Other writers were then assigned script duties. Serling does not receive a writer’s billing in this film’s credits and as such it is not known the extent to which his work ended up in the final shooting script. In an interview, Serling once told of his involvement on this movie: “My first screen job was at Fox on a war flick called Between Heaven and Hell. I turned in a script that would have run for nine hours on the screen. As I recall, it was over five hundred pages. I didn’t know what the hell I was doing. They just said ”ere” fifteen hundred bucks a week –write!” So I wrote. They eventually took the thing away from me and handed it over to six other writers, but I lay claim to the fact that my version had some wonderful moments in it. In nine hours of script, by God, there has to be a couple of wonderful moments!”
Goofs: Anachronisms: The soldiers in this movie are wearing jump type boots. They should be wearing either combat boots or leggings. Jump type boots were not issued until well after WW II.
“Sam Gifford remembers : In prewar years he was an arrogant southern cotton plantation owner, married to the daughter of a colonel. At the beginning of the war he was mobilized with his National Guard unit as a sergeant. Came the day when, revolted by the cowardice of his lieutenant, who had fired at his own men, he hit him. Downgraded, he was sent to a disciplinary battalion. Sam now discovers his new detachment, his new commanding officer, just another cowardly brute, Captain Waco Grimes. While in combat, Sam will gradually become closer to the privates, working-class people he used to despise. He will become another man, a better man. Written by Guy Bellinger”
