Kattiera Nana I think this is a new genre that they're all sort of working their way through it and haven't got all the kinks worked out yet but it's a genre that works for me.

Interesteg What makes it different from others?

GamerTab That was an excellent one.

Billy Ollie Through painfully honest and emotional moments, the movie becomes irresistibly relatable

MissSimonetta The Spy in Black (1939) seems like it would be your standard spy thriller with a heaping helping of Allied propaganda, but it is much more than that. It's as much a humanist dramedy as it is an espionage picture. The World War I setting allows Conrad Veidt's German submarine captain to be honorable, charming, and even romantic, despite his status as "the enemy." Valerie Hobson is understated and effective as the English double agent who finds herself falling for Veidt against her better judgement. The sexual tension between them is palpable, bringing an erotic energy to already tense scenes between them. The movie ends on a note of melancholy, with a sense of weariness that humaneness and tenderness mean nothing in the face of war.This is one of director Michael Powell's earlier efforts and you can see even now his magic. I would not put TSIB in the same category as The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, Black Narcissus, or my personal favorite The Red Shoes, but it is an above average movie well worth your time. And of course, fans of Conrad Veidt-- well, you won't want to miss out either.

robert-temple-1 This film was the first collaboration between Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger. In this case, Michael Powell was the director, at which he did a superb job, and Pressburger wrote the screenplay, based upon a story by J. Storer Clouston. Four of Clouston's novels were filmed (one twice) between 1917 and 1939, this being the last. The other which tends to be known by cinéastes gave the story to Marcel Carné's farce set in Victorian London, DROLE DE DRAME (1937). This film, set in the First World War, is notable for the first credited appearance in a feature film of Marius Goring, who the following year would be so brilliant in the mystery film THE CASE OF THE FRIGHTENED LADY (1940, see my review), and go on to a splendid career. Here he plays Lieutenant Schuster, second in command of the German submarine U-29. The captain of that submarine is played by one of my favourite actors of the period, Conrad Veidt, whose early death only four years later at the age of only 50 was a great loss to the cinema, despite the fact that by that time he had already made 118 films (maybe that's what killed him!) Veidt is as usual noted for his gravitas and presence, and does an excellent job, despite there not being any character development or any scenes offering any particular acting challenge. The female lead is Valerie Hobson, who instead of being her usual beautiful and romantic self, here has to play an icy German agent. But in fact she is really a double agent, i.e. a British agent posing as a German agent. When she is being a British agent she is very nice, but when she is being a German agent, she is horrid. And of course that is very appropriate. This film was produced just before the Second World War began, and was a useful 'shot across the bow' of the complacent Chamberlain faction, reminding the public of the dangers of the Hun. In fact we see lots of real shots across the bow in this film because it involves naval espionage and naval actions. A considerable amount of real footage of the British fleet is incorporated in the film, showing many ships which must have been sunk within two or three years of the filming. We see battleships firing their guns, depths charges being fired by destroyers, ships travelling in convoy, and military historians can only react with glee at all these glimpses of the British Navy as it was just before hostilities with Germany recommenced. For the modern DVD, the film has been perfectly and lovingly remastered and restored by the British Film Institute's restoration team, those insufficiently appreciated heroes of the cinema, who by their expertise have preserved so much that is precious of our cinematic heritage, which would otherwise have been lost. (For one of their greatest triumphs, see the amazing silent film, UNDERGROUND, of 1928, and my review of it.) As for the story of this film, it is rather complicated and a gripping yarn. Helen Haye (who so dominated THE CASE OF THE FRIGHTENED LADY mentioned above) appears here as an arrogant and domineering German spy masquerading as an English aristocrat in a Rolls Royce, who throws a charming young girl off a cliff and into the sea without a qualm because she wishes to steal her identity for another German agent. The film is set in the Orkney Islands (good location footage there), and the German agent is meant to impersonate the new schoolmistress at Long Hope in order to spy upon the British Fleet at anchor in Scapa Flow. Veidt arrives by submarine to link up with her at her schoolhouse. One extraordinary feature of the story is that he brings a motorcycle with him in his submarine and lands it on the Orkneys in order to convince people that he must be a local, as how could anyone who was not a local and had arrived by submarine possibly have a motorcycle. What an amusing touch! It must be the first time in fiction or history that anyone ever transported his motorcycle underwater to an espionage rendezvous. (Or do US Navy Seals and British SAS do this all the time, one wonders. After all, a motorcycle could be useful in getting from one end of a submarine to anther quickly, couldn't it? I mean, if one wanted to countermand an order or just have a sandwich.) But the German agent who was meant to be the schoolmistress has herself been supplanted by Valerie Hobson, who just happens to speak perfect German. (She seems really to do this, so perhaps Valerie Hobson was actually a plant all along for her entire film career, secretly working for Hitler, which is why she married a British cabinet minister? That is a joke, folks, please do not sue.) Here Valerie Hobson is married to a British naval officer who pretends to be betraying his country but is not really doing so. The film is really very good indeed and also shows us what stuffed-shirts the local Scots were back then. I remember being stuck in Edinburgh on a Sunday long ago and being astonished to discover that all the cinemas and pubs were closed because it was 'the Lord's Day of Rest', and enjoying oneself was thought to be sinful. At the risk of being controversial, might I suggest that the true origins of the Taliban may lie deep within the recesses of the Scottish Kirk? And another thing, while I am on the subject of Scotland: they eat the most disgusting thing in the world, which is called 'white pudding'. I would rather eat a bowl of sheep's eyes any day than face another Scottish 'white pudding'. I won't try to describe it, but I leave its horrors to the imaginations of all fortunate enough never to have encountered one.

writers_reign I could just as easily have summarized this review as Minority Report as it's a certain twelve-to-seven I'll be outnumbered by those lining up to genuflect at ANYTHING bearing the name Michael Powell and if I had a piece of the saliva concession I'd be one happy bunny. I am, of course, equally prone to anticipate new work by favourite directors but also, I hope, sufficiently objective to record when they disappoint; a great admirer of Diane Kurys I was there when L'Anniversaire opened a couple of years back and I really needn't have bothered; Nicole Garcia makes, as a rule, fine movies but Selon Charlie was ho-hum at best; Marion Vernoux made an exquisite film in Rien a faire so I was there on the first day when her latest, A Boire opened: least said ... On the other hand I've never really understood the fuss about Michael Powell, competent, sure, entertaining, on the whole, but DEIFICATION? Gimme a break. It lost me from Frame #1 when having been informed we are in Kiel in the middle of World War I the first thing we see is a newspaper Banner Headline in English which is compounded by people in a hotel, whom it is reasonable to assume are largely German, speaking not only English but using English idiomatic speech. The plot is set in motion when U-boat commander Conrad Veidt is given a mission to infiltrate English security in the Orkneys, a cue for us to cut to that locale. The next sequence is almost beyond parody. A young girl is leaving an inn to take up a post as a schoolteacher on a small island; for the sake of exposition she is obliged to explain this to the landlady who is seeing her off and throw in the additional information that she has obtained both a passport and a Visa. At this juncture an elderly matron turns up in a chauffeur driven car and asks for a room. For no reason other than to move the plot forward she is immediately put in the picture about the schoolteacher which prompts her to offer to drive her to the ferry. En route - and in a time of War and ultra high security - the girl not only reveals that she has a passport but actually PRODUCES it, whereby she is chloroformed by the elderly party so that substitute, in the shape of Valerie Hobson, may take her place. In the fullness of one reel Hobson is installed in the schoolteacher's cottage and has rendez-voused with Veidt; the plan is for a team of U-boats to assemble and sink half the British fleet at Scapa Flow with the help of a disgruntled Royal Navy Officer. Of course what transpires is the equivalent of 'it was all a dream'; the disgruntled Navy type, Sebastian Shaw is really a counter-spy as is Hobson and THEIR plan is to lure as many U-boats as possible into the area then drop a few dozen depth-charges where they will do the most good.It's not ALL bad, of course. Only about two thirds of it.

mail-671 This excellent birth of "The Archers" just managed its London premiere the very week WWII was declared in Britain and all places of entertainment were ordered to close,albeit temporarily. Second of all Veidt was and is my favourite actor,having seen all but some rare silents from "Caligari" onwards. He was the definitive popular German swine(Eric Von,notwithstanding)although he did play many other parts - Jew Suss/Under The Red Robe,a mediaeval swashbuckler, the mysterious stranger in "Passing of the 3rd Floor,Back" or the aviator in "FP1"(English version). Shortly after fleeing the Nazis (whom he loathed) in the 30s he gladly set up a home near Korda's famous Denham studios and was a doting father to his daughter while soon becoming the tall and cultured idol of thousands of women.He was also a Korda favourite and this first pairing with then one of Britain's favourite glamour girls.Valerie Hobson, following her brief success with Universal,he was rushed into another naval adventure,"Contraband" equally entertaining. Like,say, Hitchcock's "The Lady Vanishes", this is great escapist stuff with a mystery character at the centre of the story. But one point in the movie has always bothered me - just how does one manhandle a motor cycle up the steep conning tower of a submarine? We are never shown how Veidt managed it!By the same token, how did Erik in "Phantom of the Opera" manage to get his organ/piano into his hideout amongst the Paris sewers? After all, we see the problem he had with the small boat! Curiously, Veidt's Nazi officer in "Escape" & "Casablanca" both died in the middle of a phone call while attempting the prevent an escape."Spy" has its share of amusing lines & allusions. On his entry at the start he & fellow submariner get seated at a crowded fashionable hotel anticipating a slap-up meal after a long period at sea only to be told almost every dish is "off" - even for naval officers. They leave in disgust & still starved. A while later when Hardt has been secretly landed on the Orkneys with motorcycle,late at night & having avoided discovery.he meets his contact V Hobson (a British agent posing as a local teacher)at home. Entering the kitchen he stops short & stares hard,alarming her and utters the word "boota!" in some disbelief which she interprets as "no,"butter!".and as he proceeds to dig with relish into a side of ham he remarks "These English - they are so long without their food!" The time was WW1 and an ironic comment on the German shortages - but the film's settings were equally appropriate to forthcoming WW2 conditions in Britain. During the film's production all the menacing signs of 1938/1939 were there but it seemed only Churchill was convinced of the inevitable when everyone wanted to believe Chamberlain. The film's scheduled release to London's Odeon cinema did not anticipate the decisive act of Germany's invasion of Poland.Sadly, there was a real-life similarity in both Veidt's & Bing Crosby's sudden collapse just following a game of golf. Veidt had barely turned 50 as a Warner's star and still had lots to offer.