This is How Movies Should Be Made

Intense, gripping, stylish and poignant

Charming and brutal

Good films always raise compelling questions, whether the format is fiction or documentary fact.

French actress Annabella, (whose brother was killed by the Nazis)after leaving her native country for the broader horizons of Hollywood often devoted her career to propaganda movies :"tonight we raid Calais " (1943) " 13,Rue Madeleine " ,probably the best of the lot ,and this one.This is a low budget movie entirely filmed in studios.It depicts a chocolate box Germany (and Holland).Montgomery is a war prisoner who escapes from a camp with a Russian (!) doctor and tries to get to England,carrying important documents ,not to fall into the Nazi's hands.Watchable,if completely implausible (mainly the ending),this movie makes sometimes think ,in its last part,of George Seaton's "the counterfeit traitor" (1962), a feeling the presence of the Nazi brat reinforces .

George Montgomery is an American pilot who flies bombers for the RAF. While on a bombing mission over Germany his plane is downed. One of his crew bails out and is shot up by Nazi pilot Martin Kosleck while hanging in his parachute. Montgomery crashes and is captured by the Germans. He is sent to an escape-proof castle where the German's keep their high risk prisoners. There he meets a Czech officer, Kent Taylor and a Russian doctor who is played by Annabella. They manage to escape during an Allied bombing raid and lead the Gestapo on a merry chase across the country. Then it turns out that Taylor is really a Nazi spy hoping to reach England with the perfect story. Fists fly and guns blaze before the nasty Nazi is disposed of. Montgomery and Annabella then manage to get to the Ducth underground who get them to England. There is even time to even the score with the evil Martin Kosleck. Quick pace and decent production values move this one right along. The film features some good model work for the aircraft scenes. Annabella was the one time wife of film star Tyrone power. Good war thriller.