BY DOUG OSWALD

John Wayne is Joe January, an American living in late 19th century Timbuktu, in “Legend of the Lost,” released on Blu-ray by Kino Lorber. We first meet Dita (Sophia Loren) when she attempts to steal a watch from Paul Bonnard (Rosano Brazzi) who is speaking with the local magistrate, Prefect Dukas (Kurt Kaznar). She is chased and soon surrenders to Dukas’s men. Paul drops all charges and pays her fine which pleases the greedy Dukas. He also gives Dita the watch. How can one resist? This is Sophia Loren after all. Meanwhile, we meet Joe making himself at home in an open jail cell in order to pay off a fine, presumably for public drunkenness. Paul Bonnard agrees to pay his debt as well, but in return for Joe agreeing to guide him through the Sahara Desert to an as yet unknown destination. Dita asks to join them, but is turned away by Joe and he departs with Paul with six supply laden mules.

Shortly after setting off, Joe and Paul encounter a group of nomads who depart as quickly as they arrived. Except they leave someone behind. It’s Dita, who has followed them to join Paul. The three of them survive a desert sand storm followed by thirst as their water runs low. Along their journey, Joe begins to fall for Dita, who spurns him, but that doesn’t stop him from trying to offer her a drink. As their water runs even lower, Joe is ready to return to Timbuktu, but Dita empties their canteens and Paul reveals he is looking for the Holy City of Opher, which his father discovered when Paul was a boy. His father told Paul stories of riches, but his father never returned. Paul has been obsessed with finding the lost city and solving the mystery of his father’s disappearance. They find an oasis with help from one of their remaining mules and they can rest and refresh themselves.

Paul comes to them saying he found the city. It turns out to be the ruins of an ancient Roman city, but it’s actually much more than that. They make another discovery which has devastating results for Joe, Dita and Paul. Rosano Brazzi gives a credible performance as Paul, the man both obsessed with and haunted by the answer to the secret of his long lost father. Sophia Loren is beautiful and gives a stoic performance as a former prostitute and lost soul in search of a way out of her existence in Timbuktu. The Duke rounds out this trio as Joe, another lost soul, presumably a former member of the French Foreign Legion. Three lost souls in search of a lost city.

According to IMDb, director of photography Jack Cardiff states in his autobiography he thought the Duke was playing a former Foreign Legionnaire, but the Duke arrived on set wearing western gear and a cowboy hat. Cardiff asked director Henry Hathaway, who responded to Cardiff with the obvious response, “He always wears the cowboy outfit!" Cowboy or French Legionnaire? It matters very little either way. Maybe he’s a cowboy who joined the Foreign Legion.

Directed by Henry Hathaway, who directed the Duke in six movies starting with “The Shepherd of the Hils” (1941), “North to Alaska” (1960), “Circus World” (1964), “The Suns of Katie Elder” (1965) and finally “True Grit” (1969), for which the Duke won his Best Actor Oscar. He also directed three of the five segments in “How the West Was Won” (1962), but the Duke appears as General Sherman in the Civil War segment which was directed by John Ford. Hathaway is a greatly under-appreciated director, but his collaborations with the Duke alone are worthy of repeat viewing and are very entertaining. “Legend of the Lost” is no exception. The screenplay is by Robert Presnell, Jr. and Hollywood legend Ben Hecht. Hecht collaborated with Hathaway on three movies featuring the Duke.

Jack Cardff filmed on location in Libya at the Roman city Leptis Magna, Zliten (Timbuktu) and in the Libyan Desert. The scenes filmed in the Roman ruins of Leptis Magna have a dream like quality and the desert locations are beautifully photographed which up the ante on the production value.

Released by United Artists in December 1957, the Kino Lorber Blu-ray looks and sounds terrific and clocks in at 109 minutes. The only extras on the disc are the trailer for this and other Kino Lorber releases. The movie is a leisurely adventure outing for the Duke, unique in his canon of films, and he’s teamed with two titans of Italian cinema, Brazzi and Loren. The Duke is as stoic as ever and gives a fine performance.

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