Woohoo, Fritz Lang and Graham Greene, together at last! Alas, neither one was happy with the output, which they could blame largely on writer-producer Seton I. Miller exercising too much creative control in his deviation from the novel. But the movie's still pretty esteemed, so I had to check it out.
At a British village fair, Stephen Neale (Ray Milland) accidentally says a code phrase and comes into possession of a cake containing a MacGuffin. Someone tries to make off with it by violent force, but the chaos of war ensures that nobody has it anymore. Suspecting the alleged charity that gave him the cake, Neale hires a PI (Erskine Sanford) to help investigate. Organizer Willi Hilfe (Carl Esmond) and his sister Carla (Marjorie Reynolds) appear surprised at the possibility of a spy ring in their ranks and offer their own cooperation. Of course, this wouldn't be the first Lang picture or the first Greene picture to feature major secret Nazi infiltration, so our heroes may have bitten off more than they can chew. It doesn't help that Neale wants to avoid contact with the police, because he was only recently released from an asylum....
Showing posts with label graham greene. Show all posts
Showing posts with label graham greene. Show all posts
Saturday, June 26, 2021
Wednesday, December 30, 2020
Went the Day Well? (1942)
Yes, another oldie that concerns World War II already, but that's about where the similarity ends. This one's serious, British, produced during said war, and devoid of any names familiar to me except writer Graham Greene.
In the fictional backwater English village of Bramley End (which Netflix misnames Bramley Green), German paratroopers show up disguised as British soldiers. Locals are just beginning to suspect them when they drop the act and capture almost the entire population in the church on Whitsunday. They demand complete obedience to give the outside world no clues, lest they kill more than the resisting parties. For about 48 hours (incidentally the title of another adaptation of the Greene story), the villagers do what they can to stop the invasion from progressing.
In the fictional backwater English village of Bramley End (which Netflix misnames Bramley Green), German paratroopers show up disguised as British soldiers. Locals are just beginning to suspect them when they drop the act and capture almost the entire population in the church on Whitsunday. They demand complete obedience to give the outside world no clues, lest they kill more than the resisting parties. For about 48 hours (incidentally the title of another adaptation of the Greene story), the villagers do what they can to stop the invasion from progressing.
Saturday, January 30, 2016
Our Man in Havana (1959)
My prior experience of director Carol Reed, while pretty good, did not whet my appetite for more. But when I saw that he got back together with author Graham Greene, I thought that this might be the closest I'd get to another The Third Man.
Shot shortly after the Cuban Revolution but set slightly before it, the film focuses on a transplanted English vacuum cleaner salesman, Jim Wormold (Alec Guinness). A member of the British Secret Service invites him to become a spy, because such a man doesn't arouse much suspicion. Netflix says he "unwittingly" agrees, but that's misleading: He knows what his employer is and what it expects of him; he just bites off more than he can chew, failing to recruit a team. Too desperate for money to admit defeat -- thanks largely to extravagant young adult daughter Milly, despite her dating the generous local despot (Ernie Kovacs) -- Wormold lies about both recruits and discoveries in espionage. By the time he receives some actual teammates, most notably his secretary (Maureen O'Hara), he starts to worry he'll be found out. But that shouldn't be his biggest worry, seeing as an unnamed enemy agency takes him as seriously as his own does. Burl Ives has a supporting role as a German friend who meets the enemy.
Shot shortly after the Cuban Revolution but set slightly before it, the film focuses on a transplanted English vacuum cleaner salesman, Jim Wormold (Alec Guinness). A member of the British Secret Service invites him to become a spy, because such a man doesn't arouse much suspicion. Netflix says he "unwittingly" agrees, but that's misleading: He knows what his employer is and what it expects of him; he just bites off more than he can chew, failing to recruit a team. Too desperate for money to admit defeat -- thanks largely to extravagant young adult daughter Milly, despite her dating the generous local despot (Ernie Kovacs) -- Wormold lies about both recruits and discoveries in espionage. By the time he receives some actual teammates, most notably his secretary (Maureen O'Hara), he starts to worry he'll be found out. But that shouldn't be his biggest worry, seeing as an unnamed enemy agency takes him as seriously as his own does. Burl Ives has a supporting role as a German friend who meets the enemy.
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