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On the verge of the new World War, a striking view of the old one. Berlin in 1917 is an overcrowded hotel, the naval commander (Conrad Veidt) returns with a mighty appetite but the kitchen has only boiled fish and carrots. (Murder's gourmet motif is the first of several Hitchcockisms, up to the vicar's admonition of tardiness at dinner: "Not only incivility, but criminal waste!") The destruction of British vessels is the operation's goal, figuring prominently in it is the Scottish schoolteacher (Valerie Hobson) introduced with chloroformed scarfs. Heine's Lorelei for the contact, ham and bread and butter for the weary spy with the motorcycle in the bedroom. "I had no idea secret agent was such a comfortable profession." Espionage and counterespionage, a couple's emotional combat zone (the protagonists are framed in profile in front of the battleship-filled screen that is the boudoir window.) A thorny relationship before the camera but a happy one behind it, the first meeting between Michael Powell's ardor and Emeric Pressburger's drollness. Breezy early scenes with cameos and gags (Skelton Knaggs in a sailor suit, triumphant newspaper headlines followed by black "censored" bars), suspense aboard submarines and around seaside villages, romance and betrayal in the climactic sinking feeling. The fraught triangle with the Royal Navy officer (Sebastian Shaw) is interrupted by the reverend (Cyril Raymond), who barges in with phonograph and "The Soldier's March" under his arm. Night Train to Munich is up ahead, and there's Saville's Dark Journey with Veidt. "You are English. I am German. We are enemies! It simplifies everything." 49th Parallel begs to differ. With Marius Goring, June Duprez, Athole Stewart, Helen Haye, George Summers, and Torin Thatcher. In black and white.
--- Fernando F. Croce |