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Just as Germany invades the Sudatenland, Czech engineer Axel Bomasch fearing he may have to work for the Nazi cause, flees to England, being separated from his daughter Anna (Margaret Lockwood) on the way. Anna is imprisoned in a concentration camp where she befriends Czech nationalist Karl Marsen (Paul Henreid), he helps her make her escape and flees with her to England where they meet up with her father. Almost immediately they are hoodwinked by German agents posing as British naval officers and are brought back to Germany where Bomasch's knowledge on armour plating will be used for the imminent war. A fearless Gus Bennett (Rex Harrison) endeavours to travel to Germany in disguise to recapture the Domasch's in a daring raid.
After the success of Alfred Hitchcock's The Lady Vanishes(1938), screenplay writers Sidney Gilliat and Frank Launder returned to very similar ground with Night Train to Munich, again we have Nazi's and spies in pre-war Germany, again we are on a perilous train journey and again Margaret Lockwood is the lead and we also have Naunton Wayne as Caldicott, Basil Radford as Charters reprising their roles as the amiable Cricket loving buffoons. Its not quite as polished as Hitch's film and it is a little heavy on the propaganda, Germans being dour martyrs to the cause, all the Brits being, chirpy "Mornin Govnor" types, but there's still plenty to enjoy, Rex Harrison's cocky Gus Bennett, in a series of disguises and treating us to some seaside numbers, Naunton and Wayne are comedic top form, the train scenes also have plenty of tension as we race to a heart stopping climax on a cable car.
score 8/10
Prof-Hieronymos-Grost 12 September 2008
Reprint: https://www.imdb.com/review/rw1944718/ |
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28-2-2021 00:06:18