Run for the Sun is a 1956 thriller adventure film directed by Ray Boulting, starring Richard Widmark, Trevor Howard, and Jane Greer. It is an adaptation of "The Most Dangerous Game" by Richard Connell.
Katie Connors (Greer), a writer for a tabloid magazine, travels to Mexico to find reclusive novelist Mike Latimer (Widmark). When she uncovers him, the two develop feelings for each other, and Mike offers to fly her back to Mexico City. After their plane crashes in the jungle, they are rescued by an Englishman named Browne (Howard), who seems very hospitable at first but harbors a dark secret: he is traitor wanted for having collaborated with the Nazis, and his companions are Nazi war criminals. Mike and Kate escape into the jungle and find themselves the quarry of their former host in a desperate hunt.
Run for the Tropes:
- #1 Dime: Latimer keeps a rifle cartridge as a lucky piece. During World War II an enemy soldier had him at gunpoint but the gun misfired. He took out the soldier and kept the bullet because it "... had his name on it."
- Alliterative Name: Kate Conners.
- Argentina Is Nazi-Land: Browne, an English traitor who broadcast propaganda for the Nazis during the war; his brother-in-law, Nazi war criminal Colonel Von Andre; and their Luftwaffe pilot Jan are hiding in an old hacienda in Central America. Mostly they are just hiding from justice, although Von Andre harbours hopes of one day returning to Germany.
- Angry Guard Dog: Browne and Von Andre keep a pack of savage dobermans in the their compound to stop their 'guests' from trying to escape.
- Booby Trap: While being pursued through the jungle, the wilderness-wise Latimer rigs a crude bow-and-arrow booby trap that kills Jan.
- Chekhov's Gun:
- Kate's magnetized notepad (it allows her attach a pen to the side of the pad) which she uses in the hotel bar and keeps in her purse. This is what later throws off the compass in the plane off and causes them to get lost.
- Mike's Designated Bullet that acts as his #1 Dime. During the climax, he pushes the cartridge though a bullet hole in a door and then fires it by hitting the primer with a nail and a rock. It goes off and kills Browne on the other side of the door.
- Coincidental Broadcast: When Van Anders gets the radio working, the first thing it picks up is a news broadcast about Mike and Kate's missing plane.
- Convenient Decoy Cat: While trying to escape, Mike and Kate run into one of the huts of the Indians Browne and Von Andre are using as a slave labour force. On hearing the dogs approaching, the Indians release a puma they have tied up inside and let it jump out the window. The dogs immediately react to the big cat and start chasing it, causing Browne and Von andre to assume it was the puma the dogs had homed in on.
- Cover Identity Anomaly: Van Anders is claiming to be a Dutch archaeologist, but when Kate goes through the hacienda's library, she doesn't find a single book on archaeology.
- Designated Bullet: Latimer keeps a rifle cartridge as a lucky piece. During World War II an enemy soldier had him at gunpoint but the gun misfired. He took out the soldier and kept the bullet because it "... had his name on it." He finds another use for it. In a much copied scene he pushes the cartridge though a bullet hole in a door and then fires it by hitting the primer with a nail and a rock. It goes off and kills his enemy on the other side of the door.
- Full-Boar Action: While chasing Mike and Kate, Browne and Von Andre encounter a group of wild pigs who attack the dogs; killing several.
- Hunting the Most Dangerous Game: When Mike and Kate escape into the jungle, Browne, Von Andre and Jan set of after them with rifles and hunting dogs. Unlike the story it is based, here the hunt is to stop them escaping rather than for sport.
- No Celebrities Were Harmed: Reclusive adventure novelist Mike Latimer is very heavily based on Ernest Hemingway.
- This Is My Name on Foreign: Nazi Colonel Von Andre is masquerading as Dutch archaeologist Dr. Van Anders.
- Those Wacky Nazis: Browne is an Englishman who broadcast propaganda for the Nazis; Von Andre is an army colonel wanted for ordering the massacre of an entire town; and Jan is a Luftwaffe pilot.
- Tokyo Rose: Latimer realizes it is Browne's voice he recognizes, and that he is an infamous turncoat who during the war broadcast Nazi propaganda from Berlin to Britain after he had married a German girl.
- The Voiceless: Jan never says anything beyond a few grunts, with Browne describing him as 'a man of few words'. It seems likely that he does not speak English, explaining why he never talks to Mike and Katie. They do see him talking to Van Anders at one point (presumably in German) but they are too far away to hear what he says.
