Vic Tayback | Through the Shattered Lens

Welcome to Retro Television Reviews, a feature where we review some of our favorite and least favorite shows of the past! On Sundays, I will be reviewing the made-for-television movies that used to be a primetime mainstay. Today’s film is 1973’s The Alpha Caper! It can be viewed on YouTube!

After years of faithful service and hard work, parole officer Mark Forbes (Henry Fonda) is on the verge of mandatory retirement. He’s spent his entire career playing by the rules and taking orders and helping recently released criminals go straight. For all of his service, all he’s gets is a small party and a cheap retirement gift.

Still, Mark is on the job when he gets a call that one of his parolees, Harry (Noah Beery, Jr.), is currently in the middle of a stand-off with the cops. Mark goes to the crime scene, where he discovers that Harry was trying to rob a warehouse full of weapons. He also discovers that Harry is dying, as the result of being shot by the police. Before Harry passes, he tells Mark that he and three other ex-cons were plotting to steal a shipment of gold bars.

Mark decides to carry out Harry’s plan. Working with Mitch (Leonard Nimoy), Tudor (Larry Hagman), and Scat (James McEachin), Mark comes up with a plan to rob the armored cars that are going to be transporting the gold. While Tudor and Scat are quick to join up with Mark, Mitch is a bit more hesitant. In the end, though, they all decide to work together. The plan they come up with is a clever one but its main strength is that it’s being spearheaded by Mark, a man who no one would ever expect to commit a crime. No one but his colleague and friend, Lee (John Marley), that is.

I watched The Alpha Caper last night, with my friend Phil, Janeen, and Spiro. To be honest, I selected the film because the title led me to suspect that it would be a science fiction film of some sort. I was a little surprised when it turned out to be a crime thriller but I was even more surprised by just how good the film itself turned out to be. Cleverly plotted and well-acted by the entire cast (and featuring a scruffy Leonard Nimoy playing a role that’s about as far from the coldly logical Mr. Spock as one can get), The Alpha Caper is an entertaining crime film but it’s also surprisingly poignant. Mark is someone who feels that he’s lived his entire life without taking a single risk and, as a result, he has nothing to show for it. He compares his situation to the mythical Kilroy of “Kilroy was Here” graffiti fame. Kilroy will always be remembered, even though no one is really sure who he was. Mark fears that he’s destined to be forgotten. The robbery is Mark’s way of announcing that “Mark Forbes was here.” The film ends on a surprisingly touching, if rather bittersweet, note.

The Alpha Caper originally aired on ABC on October 6th, 1973. It was apparently meant to be a pilot for an anthology show that would be called Crime. The series wasn’t picked up but, two years later, The Alpha Caper was theatrically released in Italy. Today, it can be seen on YouTube. Like Mark Forbes and Kilroy, the film has not been forgotten.

Emperor of the North Pole is the story of depression-era hobos and one man who is determined to kill them.

The year is 1933 and Shack (Ernest Borgnine) is one of the toughest conductors around. At a time when destitute and desperate men are riding the rails in search of work and food, Shack has declared that no one will ride his train for free. When Shack is first introduced, the sadistic conductor is seen shoving a hobo off of his train and onto the tracks. Shack smiles with satisfaction when the man is chopped in half under the train’s wheels.

A-No.1 (Lee Marvin) is a legend, the unofficial king of the hobos. A grizzled veteran, A-No. 1 has been riding the rails for most of his life. (The title comes from the hobo saying that great hobos, like A-No. 1, are like the Emperor of the North Pole, the ruler of a vast wasteland). A-No. 1 is determined to do what no hobo has ever done, successfully hitch a ride on Shack’s train. He even tags a water tower, announcing to everyone that he intends to take Shack’s train all the way to Portland.

If A-No. 1 did not have enough to worry about with Shack determined to get him, he is also being tailed by Cigaret (Keith Carradine), a young and cocky hobo who is determined to become as big a legend as A-No. 1. Cigaret and A. No. 1 may work together but they never trust each other.

Like many of Robert Aldrich’s later films, Emperor of the North Pole is too long and the rambling narrative often promises more than it can deliver. Like almost all movies that were released at the time, Emperor of North Pole attempts to turn its story into a contemporary allegory, with Shack standing in for the establishment, A-No. 1 representing the liberal anti-establishment, and, most problematically, Cigaret serving as a symbol for the callow counter culture, eager to take credit for A-No. 1’s accomplishments but not willing to put in any hard work himself.

As an allegory, Emperor of the North Pole is too heavy-handed but, as a gritty adventure film, it works wonderfully. Lee Marvin is perfectly cast as the wise, no-nonsense A-No. 1. This was the sixth film in which Marvin and Borgnine co-starred and the two old pros both go at each other with gusto. Carradine does the best he can with an underwritten part but this is Borgnine and Marvin’s film all the way. Marvin’s trademark underacting meshes perfectly with Borgnine’s trademark overacting, with the movie making perfect use of both men’s distinctive screen personas. As staged by Aldrich, the final fight between Shack and A-No. 1 is a classic.

Even at a time when almost every anti-establishment film of the early 70s is being rediscovered, Emperor of the North Pole remains unjustly obscure. When it was first released, it struggled at the box office. Unsure of how to sell a movie about hobos and worrying that audiences were staying away because they thought it might be a Christmas film, 20th Century Fox pulled the movie from circulation and then rereleased it under a slightly altered name: Emperor of the North. As far as titles go, Emperor of the North makes even less sense than Emperor of the North Pole. Even with the title change, Emperor of the North Pole flopped at the box office but, fortunately for him, Aldrich was already working on what would become his biggest hit: The Longest Yard.

Keep an eye out for Lance Henriksen, in one of his earliest roles. Supposedly, he plays a railroad worker. If you spot him, let me know because I have watched Emperor of the North Pole three times and I still can’t find him.