The Lebanese Mission

It was the last line for estimable director Richard Pottier,the man who directed the first version of "some like it hot" ("Fanfare D'Amour" ).He could also be good at films noirs as "Meurtres" or "la Ferme Aux Loups" bear witness.But as far as adventure movies are concerned ,it does not really make it.The screenplay is not only dull and slow,as the precedent users pointed out,it's also desultory and incoherent.Pierre Benoit's books were extravaganzas ("L'Atlantide" on which Pabst based one of his movies) which were acceptable in the exotic atmosphere of the FRench thirties ;in the fifties,it was over the hill.The adventure movie,as HG Clouzot had brilliantly proved ("le Salaire De lA Peur") became more demanding.....

What have we got here: an absurd cast gathering French (Jean Claude Pascal as the handsome macho raider ,Jean Servais as the villain),Gianna Maria Canale ,the Italian Beauty ,as a treacherous courtesan , Omar Sharif (you read well:he was credited under his Egyptian name) ,Jean Lefevre (later a specialist of French coarse comedies),Lucianna Paoluzzi (later a James Bond girl in "Thunderball" as Paluzzi)..... And even Juliette Greco who pulls the obligatory little tune in a nightclub .Both Greco's song and a belly dance are mostly filler.

The subject revolves around uranium which was found by Sharif in the Arabian desert.Despite the ending,"the treasure of the Sierra Madre" ,it isn't....