13th JUNE: ICE COLD IN ALEX – ONLY ON BLURAY – DIGITALLY RESTORED
WWII, North Africa. When the Germans begin an attack on the Allied held town of Tobruck in Libya, an evacuation is ordered. A fatigued transport pool Officer Captain Anson (John Mills) and his loyal MSM Tom Pugh (Harry Andrews) commandeer a battered old ambulance, and taking aboard two nurses left behind, they decide to cross the desert back to British lines. They soon encounter a South African officer, Captain Van der Poel (Anthony Quayle) whose two large bottles of gin persuade Anson to let him travel with them.
All manner of obstacles threaten to curtail their progress through the desert - a minefield, a broken suspension spring, some quick-sand – and Van der Poel quickly arouses suspicion with his obsessive attachment to his large and mysterious backpack, and lack of knowledge of South African tea-brewing techniques. All the while, all that sustains them is Captain Anson’s promise of the tall, frothy, ice-cold glasses of beer that await them upon their arrival in Alexandria (the “Alex” of the title).
