Pride of the Marines

Pride of the Marines is a 1945 American black-and-white drama from Warner Bros. directed by Delmer Daves, starring John Garfield and Eleanor Parker in the true story of Al Schmid, a Philadelphia welder who joined the Marines after Pearl Harbor, was blinded by a grenade at Guadalcanal, and had to rebuild his life at home.¹ The screenplay by Albert Maltz, with an adaptation by Marvin Borowsky, was based on Roger Butterfield's 1944 book Al Schmid, Marine.¹

The true story behind the film

Al Schmid was a welder who won fame during the battle of Guadalcanal when, as depicted in the film, he killed 200 Japanese soldiers during a night attack. He was blinded by a grenade early in the morning but refused to relinquish his position, continuing to fight by having a wounded soldier tell him where to point his gun.¹ A review-based account of the historical action adds that the Japanese attack involved 800 men, that Schmid was wounded several times but kept firing for four hours, and that 200 bodies were later found in front of his position; his effort earned him the Navy Cross.^{3 • 4}

Butterfield had written a March 1943 Life magazine story about Schmid and his struggle with blindness, then turned it into the book Al Schmid: Marine published the next year.⁴ By September 1945, Schmid was living in Philadelphia with his wife and one-year-old son; his eyesight was limited to the perception of bright colors and moving objects, and he spent his time typing letters to friends, listening to Bing Crosby recordings, and fishing.¹

Production

The film's working title was This Love of Ours. Production ran from mid-November 1944 to mid-February 1945, with some scenes shot on location in Philadelphia and at the San Diego Naval Hospital.¹ Ann Doran was borrowed from Paramount for the picture, and cinematographer Sol Polito substituted for Peverell Marley while the latter was out with the flu. Two Marine Corps officers, Major Louis Aronson and Major Gordon Warner, served as technical advisors.¹

In a January 1946 Saturday Evening Post article, John Garfield cited Al Schmid as his favorite movie role; he had befriended the Schmids and took the part seriously.^{1 • 3} Garfield and Parker reprised their roles in a Lux Radio Theatre broadcast on 31 December 1945.¹

Reception and significance

Contemporary response was mixed to positive. Wolcott Gibbs, the longtime theater critic of The New Yorker, wrote in September 1945 that most of the film had "a somewhat familiar and mechanical air" but credited Garfield's "honest and very intelligent performance" for its effective moments.⁶ Later assessments have been warmer: Time Out called the film "always watchable, sometimes riveting," noting its thoughtful script and a divisive dream sequence, while observing that its patriotism can be hard to stomach.⁷ The Karlovy Vary International Film Festival's 2025 program described it as considered one of America's finest war dramas, adopting "a remarkably modern stance" on Americans' attitude to national minorities.²

The film was among the first to tackle physical and mental rehabilitation for veterans and to frankly address problems returning soldiers might face, such as unemployment and racial and religious discrimination.⁸ Frank Sinatra, in a 1945 letter to Maltz, wrote that he had never been so emotionally moved by anything and called movies "the greatest, most effective weapon" against bigotry.⁸ A scholarly account of World War II cinema places the film among works intended to assuage public anxiety about veterans' readjustment, though it notes that The Best Years of Our Lives (1946) later dealt with the same theme on a larger scale.⁹

Maltz and the blacklist. Albert Maltz received an Academy Award nomination for the screenplay and was later blacklisted.¹ In 1947 he was called to testify before the House Un-American Activities Committee and was subsequently blacklisted and imprisoned as one of the Hollywood Ten. In 1960 Sinatra attempted to break the blacklist by openly hiring Maltz for an adaptation of The Execution of Private Slovik, but abandoned the project under pressure from industry and political forces.⁸

The 1936 film of the same name

The title had been used nine years earlier by Columbia Pictures for a 64- or 66-minute drama released 2 April 1936, directed by D. Ross Lederman, written by Harold Shumate, and starring Charles Bickford and Florence Rice. It was based on Gerald Beaumont's short story "Pride of the Marines," published in Red Book Magazine in January 1921, and its working title was United States Smith.¹⁰

References

1. Pride of the Marines (1945), AFI Catalog of Feature Films
2. Pride of the Marines, Karlovy Vary International Film Festival program
3. Pride of the Marines (1945), The War Movie Buff
4. Homecomings, Killer Ants, and War Games: A Roundtable on Teaching with Popular Films, SHAFR
5. Pride of the Marines (1945), Rotten Tomatoes
6. Wolcott Gibbs, "Take a Deep Breath," The New Yorker, 8 September 1945
7. Pride of the Marines review, Time Out
8. Read Frank Sinatra's 1945 Letter on Why Movies Are the 'Most Effective Weapon' Against Discrimination, TIME
9. American Film and Society Since 1945 (preview)
10. Pride of the Marines (1936), AFI Catalog of Feature Films

Initially written Oct 3, 2026 · Reviewed: Oct 25, 2026 · Edited: Oct 15, 2026; Oct 25, 2026; Nov 1, 2026

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