Hunting guideMike Davis came across a cache of diamonds in a mining area located in a remote region of South West Africa. He was caught by the mine's police but refused to reveal the diamonds' location, even under torture at the hand of the diamond company's security chief, Vogel. He left South Africa for some time. Davis returns to get the diamonds which he still expects will be at the spot where he found them. The mining company's owner, Martingale, tries to find out where the diamonds can be found by guile rather than force. He hires a beautiful prostitute, Suzanne Renaud, to seduce Davis and get him to reveal the secret location. Davis plans an illegal entry into the diamond mining area to retrieve the diamonds and plans to escape to Portuguese Angola. Meanwhile, Vogel is attracted to Suzanne and offers to marry her. But Suzanne is attracted to Davis who is more interested in his diamonds than Suzanne. Davis finds the diamonds but Martingale threatens to kill Suzanne unless Davis gives him the diamonds. Davis gives up the diamonds and ends up leaving the country with Suzanne, discovering that he loves her more than the diamonds.
According to the Paramount Collection at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences library, the desert sequences were shot in Yuma, Arizona. Paul Henreid was blacklisted from major studios at the time but says he was cast because Dieterle was an old friend of his and Hal Wallis was supportive of the actor being cast. Henreid said the role was a departure for him but "it had the greatest lines in the script and I had a lot of fun doing it."
Reception
Critical response
Film criticGlenn Erickson reflected on the background of the film and how it was received when first released, "A polished production on all technical levels, the gritty Rope of Sand was filmed from a screenplay purchased by producer Wallis specifically for Burt Lancaster in 1947. Although William Dieterle's direction is capable, the script works too hard to introduce an overly familiar collection of stock thriller types... Critics generally liked Lancaster's performance, even if they slighted the work of Claude Rains and Peter Lorre and saved the bulk of their praise for Paul Henried's nasty villain. Lancaster's own assessment of the film was unprintable, but he was quoted at a time when he was itching to move on to more interesting roles.
