Thu 15 Jul 2010
Movie Review: THE SPY IN BLACK (1939).
Posted by Steve under Reviews , Suspense & espionage films[6] Comments
THE SPY IN BLACK. Columbia Pictures, UK, 1939. Released in the US as U-Boat 29. Conrad Veidt, Valerie Hobson, Sebastian Shaw, Marius Goring, June Duprez, Cyril Raymond. Screenplay: Emeric Pressburger, based on the novel by J. Storer Clouston. Director: Michael Powell.
What’s unusual about this wartime movie is not that it takes place in World War I, but for at least the first half of the film it’s more or less from the point of view of a German submarine captain (Conrad Veidt) who undertakes a deadly game of espionage in the Orkney Islands (all the way in the UK, off the northen tip of Scotland).
Aided by a phony schoolteacher (Valerie Hobson) and a turncoat British naval officer (Sebastian Shaw), Captain Hardt lays a deadly U-Boat trap for a large contingent of British warships. If he can pull it off, it would be a serious blow to Britain’s war making capabilities.
Things don’t go as planned, however, and that’s when the fun begins. The local vicar expects the new schoolteacher and her fiancé to come to dinner, and neither the phoney schoolteacher nor her new boarder expect the fiancé at all.
And of course that’s only the beginning. Since of course the spectacular event in the works never happened, there’s no suspense in that regard, but how it’s avoided – and who survives – is still very much up in the air.
Getting back to my first paragraph, though, it’s quite remarkable that a German officer could be portrayed as sympathetically in 1939, sort of, as Captain Hardt is in the first part of the movie – finding a good meal – with real butter! – one of the great advantages of going undercover in wartime Britain. Of course when his role requires him to become a deadly enemy, he does that too – but honorably.
I wish I could tell you what it is that makes a movie like this one so unmistakably British, but it is – a certainly style, a certain attitude – whatever it is, I think it mirrors the British people as well.
So British, I have to admit, as to make the opening scenes, taking place in Germany, somewhat awkward, if not clumsily done. The newspapers are in English, not German, and the people in the tavern speak English, not German.
Once Captain Hardt is back at sea, though, and his mission is underway, the film gets off this small artifice and the crew members speak German, or largely so.
Other than that, while not an award-winner by any means, this is still a better than average wartime thriller. It’s also one that takes place not on the battlefield or at sea, but on the home front, just in time for the next one.
July 16th, 2010 at 12:33 am
Michael Powell and Emeric Pressberger were always quirky. There is also a sympathetic German (at least Austrian)in THE LIFE AND DEATH OF COLONEL BLIMP. Though the Germans aren’t sympathetic in 49th PARALLEL the film is told from the point of view of an escaping crew of German sailors off a U-boat.
I suspect Clouston got the idea for this from the Fraulein Doktor incident that ended in a disaster for the British fleet and inspired the films STAMBOUL QUEST (with Myrna Loy) and 1969’s FRAULEIN DOKTOR.
July 16th, 2010 at 1:34 pm
Two movies that I’ve always managed to miss whenever they’ve played on TCM or anywhere else are COLONEL BLIMP and 49th PARALLEL. Either I forget to set the VCR or I do and something else goes wrong. I’m jinxed, I guess.
The copy of THE SPY IN BLACK I have is a Region 4 release. That’s Australia, I think. I haven’t seen it offered for sale anywhere else. Of course I haven’t been looking since I came up with this one.
July 16th, 2010 at 1:48 pm
Clouston, by the way, lived from 1870 to 1944, and has a list in Hubin of some 25 novels published between 1899 and 1941.
THE SPY IN BLACK was first published in 1917.
For more on “Fraulein Doktor,” the real one, see for example
http://www.principia.edu/users/els/departments/poli_sci/film_politics/fraudoc.htm
where her exploits are suggested to be more mythical than actual.
Do you know more, David?
July 16th, 2010 at 3:55 pm
A year later they did a sort of companion piece with the same two actors called CONTRABAND (U.S. BLACKOUT) which is one of my favourite thrillers. This time Veidt is a Danish Sea Captain, whilst Hobson is a British Secret Agent. Together they try to uncover a German spy ring operating in WWII London. It’s quite light-hearted, and rather sexy, and might quite easily be called ‘Hitchcockian’. Veidt and Hobson are a wonderfully sophisticated pairing, and it is fascinating to see how easily Veidt slips into the role of romantic hero. He was 47 at the time, and was pretty much typecast as a villain, so this film proves that producers should think ‘outside of the box’ more often when casting. This came out in 1940, with the Battle of Britain raging overhead. Fascinating to see how lightly people could still view the War.
July 16th, 2010 at 4:07 pm
Powell and Pressberger (known as the Archers) made a handful of great films during the war. LIFE AND DEATH OF COLONEL BLIMP is a satire on the old order confronting the new world of the war and features Roger Livesey as the Colonel Blimp of the title from his youth to old age and confronting the reality of the war. Anton Walbrook is excellent as his German friend from youth who as a refugee helps him confront the new spirit. On top of everything else it is in gorgeous color.
49th PARALLEL is one of the great adventure films of all time with an all star cast and great on location work in Canada. The all star cast includes Leslie Howard, Raymond Massey, Eric Portman, Laurence Oliver, and Glynnis Johns. It follows the hunted crew of a U-Boat as they make their way across Canada encountering various types — Olivier a French Canadian trader, Johns a member of a religious community, Howard a veddy British type writer, and Massey an ‘average’ Canadian who is trying to sneak into the US to avoid National Service in that ‘foreign war.’ The Howard and Massey sections are exceptionally well done with a neat and very satisfying twist at the end of the Massey section.
I KNOW WHERE I’M GOING with Wendy Hiller and Roger Livesey is an easy going comedy beautifully filmed in Scotland about a young woman determined to marry well who finds romance gets in the way of her plans.
STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN (A MATTER OF LIFE AND DEATH) is the story of an RAF pilot (David Niven) who finds his life and future on trial in a heavenly court. It’s a stunner visually as most Archers films were (BLACK NARCISSUS, THE RED SHOES, TALES OF HOFFMAN).
Their other wartime films include A CANTERBURY TALE (a modern retelling of Chaucer), ONE OF OUR AIRCRAFT IS MISSING (an excellent film about an RAF crew shot down in the Channel and the hunt for them), and one of the best films ever made, THE THIEF OF BAGHDAD (1940) with the Korda’s.
One of Powell’s last films, AGE OF CONSENT, based on artist Norman Lindsey’s illustrated biographical novel, features James Mason as Lindsey and the debut of a stunningly beautiful young Helen Mirren who spends much of the film in the buff (well, it is a film about the pagan Norman Lindsey). It’s an offbeat comedy beautifully filmed in Australia though you may not notice the scenery or the gorgeous underwater photography for looking at Mirren. Sam Neill later played Lindsey in SIRENS.
And of course, Powell’s PEEPING TOM was a stunning and controversial suspense film somewhat overshadowed by PSYCHO, but a must see for enthusiasts of suspense films.
July 16th, 2010 at 4:36 pm
Obviously I forgot CONTRABAND, which is every bit as good as stated. Veidt, of course had been a leading man in his native Germany in THE CABINET OF DR. CALIGARI and Paul Leni’s THE MAN WHO LAUGHED among others.
He was an early and vocal anti-Nazi, who, by all accounts, took a real pleasure in the reaction of audiences to his bad guy roles a bit like Chinese actor Richard Loo who said he smiled whenever his wartime Japanese villains drew boos or got him dirty looks on the street. Peter Lorre was another outspoken anti-Nazi who took some pleasure in playing Nazi parts as in INVISIBLE AGENT.