The Key (1958)
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| German title | The key |
| Original title | The Key |
| Country of production | Great Britain |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1958 |
| length | 134 minutes |
| Age rating | FSK 12 |
| Rod | |
| Director | Carol Reed |
| script | Carl Foreman |
| production | Carol Reed |
| music | Malcolm Arnold |
| camera | Oswald Morris |
| cut | Bert Bates |
| occupation | |
| |
The key (original title: The Key ) is a British black and white film from 1958. Directed by Carol Reed . The main roles were cast with William Holden , Sophia Loren , Trevor Howard and Oskar Homolka . Carl Foreman wrote the script . It is based on the novel "Stella" by Jan de Hartog . In his home country the film was first shown on May 28, 1958, and in the Federal Republic of Germany on September 23, 1958.
action
The film takes place in the war year 1941. Great Britain fears an impending German invasion. David Ross is appointed commander of a deep- sea tug that has the task of towing wrecked warships into port. However, the ships have the disadvantage that they are cumbersome and insufficiently armed. Nevertheless, Ross soon feels comfortable in the circle of tug captains. His joy grows when he meets his old friend Chris Ford again at the maritime rescue service.
It doesn't take long before Chris asks David to visit him. As soon as he arrived at the apartment, he was amazed when his friend introduced him to Stella, an attractive young woman of Italian descent who owned the apartment. He learns that she has had to go through all sorts of strokes of fate: Her groom was killed during a mission the day before the marriage. The same thing happened to her next friend after he gave his duplicate key to Chris before he went out to work. Now Chris lives with Stella. The two want to get married soon. Before Chris leaves for his next assignment, he gives his friend David his apartment key. What everyone feared happens again: Chris' tug is hit by an enemy torpedo on the high seas and sinks. When David tried to deliver the sad news to Stella, she had already guessed what had happened.
After Stella is free again, David is now moving in with her. The two experience a few days of great happiness. Once again David is called into action. When he discovers Stella from aboard his deep-sea tug in the dark of the quay, he follows an inner voice and throws his key to a war comrade who is just passing by.
In her apartment, Stella is desperately waiting for her husband to return. Suddenly she hears a knock and sees the door open. But it is not David who comes in, but the man to whom he threw his key. He announced that David was lost at sea. Stella then curses all the men who passed their duplicate keys on to someone else.
In the end, what Stella never expected happens: David survived the shipwreck and comes back to her.
Award
Trevor Howard was named Best Actor of the Year by the British Academy of Film and Television Arts in 1958 . The film received the rating “valuable” from the Wiesbaden film evaluation agency.
criticism
"The romance-like, symbolic love story is not very convincingly linked to effectively filmed naval war sequences."
source
Program for the film, published by Das neue Filmprogramm , Mannheim, number 4058
Web links
- The key in the Internet Movie Database (English)
- A few pictures of the film at cinema.de
- Description of the film with a short review at filmreporter.de
Individual evidence
- ↑ rororo-Taschenbuch No. 6322 (1988), p. 3289