459 Sahara

[MichaelB]

SAHARA
(Zoltán Korda, 1943)
Release date: 20 January 2025
Limited Edition Blu-ray (UK premiere)

Pre-order here

Humphrey Bogart (The Harder They Fall), Bruce Bennett (Undertow) and J Carrol Naish (The Lives of a Bengal Lancer) star in Sahara, a thrilling tale of World War II heroism from director Zoltán Korda (A Woman’s Vengeance).

Separated from his unit following the fall of Tobruk, Master Sergeant Joe Gunn (Bogart) and his crew flee in a tank across the Sahara, picking up a variety of stragglers and prisoners along the way. With their survival entirely dependent on the water from a depleted well, the group must defend it against a whole German battalion.

Produced by Harry Joe Brown (Buchanan Rides Alone) and shot under harsh conditions in the unforgiving landscape of the Colorado Desert, the production of Sahara utilised an entire US Army division as extras, adding to the film’s gritty sense of realism.

INDICATOR LIMITED EDITION BLU-RAY SPECIAL FEATURES

• High Definition remaster
• Original mono audio
• Audio commentary with screenwriter and novelist C Courtney Joyner (2025)
• Ehsan Khoshbakht on ‘Sahara’ (2025): appreciation by the curator, filmmaker, and editor of The Lady with the Torch: Columbia Pictures 1929–1959
• Building a Tank (1942): documentary short on the work of the Detroit Tank Arsenal, and the manufacture and testing of the M-3 Lee tank which prominently features in Sahara
• The Siege of Tobruk (1942): documentary short produced by the UK’s Army Film Unit detailing the World War II military campaign in the North African port of Tobruk during 1941, which preceded the events portrayed in Sahara
• Original theatrical trailer
• Image gallery: promotional and publicity material
• New and improved English subtitles for the deaf and hard of hearing
• Limited edition exclusive booklet with a new essay by Imogen Sara Smith, an archival interview with actor Kurt Kreuger, an archival on-set profile of Humphrey Bogart, a look at how the film’s promotion assisted the war effort, new writing on the short films, and film credits
• UK premiere on Blu-ray
• Limited edition of 3,000 copies for the UK
• All features subject to change

#PHILE459B
BBFC cert: PG
REGION B
EAN: 5060697924046

[domino harvey]

Nice! My write up from the War List

Sahara (Zoltan Korda 1943) Exciting African WWII tale with Bogart leading his crew of men in an armed defense of a non-existent desert oasis. Some intriguing wartime characterizations result from the film's sympathetic treatment of an Italian prisoner of war (An Oscar-nommed J Carrol Naish) versus the spiteful german captive (the suggestion here seems to be that Italian soldiers fighting for the Axis were more victims than complicit partners), and the film gives ample screentime to many of the more tortuous effects of being stuck in the desert without water.

[What A Disgrace]

I was about ready to brush off the whole lot of this announcement, but this one does sound like a genuinely great movie. I'll bite.

[Finch]

Me too. Was amused by Bogart's name being bigger even than the film's title in the poster that Nick chose for Indicator's cover.

[MichaelB]

Immediately post-Casablanca, I imagine!

[ryannichols7]

very glad this was one of the Sony titles - I remember it was speculated for the Bogart noir set, but this clearly works just fine as a standalone. those short films are a pretty inspired inclusion, much like the Ford one for Midway. I expect it'll be a fast seller...

[MichaelB]

While some of the noir titles admittedly stretch that definition, Sahara would break it altogether!

It's unambiguously a war movie with no pretensions towards being anything else, and would have stuck out like the sorest of thumbs in the Bogart set.

(Either that or the box would have to have had a different overall title, and the previous Columbia Noir boxes had all sold very well.)