Lieutenant Jim Bledsoe (Burt Lancaster) is pleased to receive his first command of the submarine Nerka, but is stymied last-minute when Commander Richardson (Clark Gable) is announced instead. Richardson had been desk-bound because his previous sub was sunk off the coast of Japan by a destroyer called the Akikaze. Bledsoe has a terrible suspicion that Richardson is just looking for revenge and is willing to risk the lives of the entire crew to get it.
This is a good movie to put on if you're laying on the couch taking a break from wrapping gifts or doomscrolling or just hungover on a Sunday. The black and white is very soothing, there's a lot of talking interspersed with some torpedo explosions, and Don Rickles is in it. It's not the best WWII movie --hell, it's not even the best WWII submarine movie-- but it's good enough. Appropriately melodramatic. There is precisely one (1) woman with a speaking role and the pin-up poster in the sub gets more screen time than she does, but you can't have everything.
It's currently streaming for free (with ads) on the Roku Channel.
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