The night after the betrayal

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Movie
German title The night after the betrayal
Original title The Informer
Country of production Great Britain
original language English
Publishing year 1929
length 83 minutes
Rod
Director Arthur Robison
script Benn Levy
Rolf E. Vanloo based on the novel The Informer by Liam O'Flaherty
production Walter Mycroft for British International Pictures, London
camera Werner Brandes
Theodor Sparkuhl
cut Emile de Ruelle
occupation

The Night After the Treason is a 1929 British drama directed by Arthur Robison . It is based on the novel The Informer by Irish writer Liam O'Flaherty .

content

1917, at the time of the Irish struggle for independence against British rule.

The Irish patriot Francis McPhillip shoots the police chief of Dublin, a British bailiff. Thereupon feverishly searched for by the British occupying forces, he has to go into hiding and receives money from friends in order to move to the USA as soon as possible. His successor is to be Gypo, who takes this successor all too literally and also wants to succeed McPhillips with his pretty friend Katie. Before the hunted embarks for America, he wants to say goodbye to Katie again. Gypo sees the two of them hugging each other, whereupon jealousy boils up in him. To get rid of McPhillip once and for all, Gypo reveals his departing predecessor to the British Occupation Police for £ 20 Judas wages . In fact, the British caught Francis and knocked him down with a bullet.

Gypo learns from Katie that the farewell hug with Francis was completely harmless, and he has a grievous remorse. He confesses everything to Katie. Soon Gypo is suspected by his own people of betraying Francis McPhillip to the British, and the hunt for him, the police spy, begins. Katie holds her protective hand over him, however, as she loves Gypo. In their hunt, the Irish freedom fighters put him at a railway bridge. When he disappears and a train rushes in, Gypo's henchmen think he's dead. But Gypo is alive, and he drags himself into Katie's house. When she discovers a picture of a young girl whom he has just helped out of an emergency, she draws the wrong conclusions and believes that Gypo is cheating on her with this very girl. Katie then drops Gypo and informs his captors while he sleeps. The men surround Katie's house and he is shot at when Gypo tries to escape. Shot on fire, the seriously injured Gypo drags himself into a church, where he meets Francis' mother and asks her for forgiveness for the betrayal he had committed to her slain son. Then he sinks dead to the ground in front of the altar, hands and feet spread apart in a symbolic cross shape.

Background and production notes

The night after the betrayal is a typical example of the German influence on the artistically decrepit British film industry in the transition from silent to talkies. The engagement of non-British workers was made easier by the British government's Cinematograph Films Act at the end of 1927. As a result, a large number of German artists were able to work in London in the following years and give British cinema new impetus. From the beginning of 1928 until Hitler came to power in 1933, they included EA Dupont , Henrik Galeen , Arthur Robison , Paul Czinner (all directors), Werner Brandes , Theodor Sparkuhl , Adolf Schlasy , Günther Krampf (all camera), OF Werndorff , Alfred Junge (all Film structures). Few of these film artists stayed for long periods of time. Among the plays brought to London before 1933 only Conrad Veidt (“Rome Express”) was able to prevail in British film.

The night after the betrayal was filmed at Elstree Studios in mid-1929. As was customary at the time, both a silent and a clay version of this film were made.

The film had its British premiere on October 17, 1929 and its German premiere on October 23, 1929 in Berlin's Capitol. A program booklet appeared with the Illustrierte Film-Kurier No. 1249. The film structures were designed by the British Norman Arnold based on drafts and models by the two Berlin star scene designers Robert Herlth and Walter Röhrig .

In early 1935, John Ford shot a much more famous version of the same material in Hollywood under the title The Traitor .

Reviews

In Der Kinematograph it was said: “Great day for English film in Germany. A particularly excited and critical audience at the premiere. Excited, because it is a work by the large English production group, created by a sensitive director who grew up in Germany. One expects the change from the specifically English taste to the necessities of film Europe. Expect a departure from the London sentiment and from the famous Anglo-Saxon excessive thoroughness, which seems banal and flat to us. (...) In terms of direction, the film is more than interesting. The German designs by Robert Herlth and Walter Röhrig, which revealed a fantastic world in the Elstree studios, are remarkable. Narrow, angled alleys, a view of large streets with a tangle of cars from a sculpture, that one hardly believes that these are interior structures if one had not stood in front of this decoration in London. "

In an assessment by the British Film Institute it says: “The first half of the sound version is shot as silent, with German director Arthur Robison fully demonstrating the level of technical sophistication that this style of filmmaking had reached by its twilight years. Without the constraints of cumbersome sound equipment, Robison's camera roams freely (...). Cinematographer Werner Brandes' lighting is imaginative and atmospheric throughout, and the film's numerous chases and shoot-outs are exhilarating and rapidly edited by Emile de Ruelle. The use of a synchronized (non-dialogue) soundtrack is also creatively used in the first part of the film. (...) The film's pace briefly falters early in the second half, with two rather stilted dialogue sequences, but picks up again with Gypo's exciting escape into the path of an oncoming train and Katie's final betrayal. "

literature

  • Hans-Michael Bock, Wolfgang Jacobsen, Jörg Schöning (Eds.): London Calling. Germans in British film of the 1930s. A CineGraph book. edition text + kritik, Munich 1993, p. 152 f.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Der Kinematograph, No. 243, October 24, 1929
  2. ↑ The night after the betrayal on screenonline.org
  3. ↑ Translation: “The first half of this sound version was shot as a silent film, where the German director Arthur Robison was able to demonstrate all his skills in terms of technical sophistication that had been achieved at the end of this era. Robison's camera moves without the constraints of cumbersome sound equipment (...). Head cameraman Werner Brandes' lighting is imaginative and atmospherically dense throughout, and the numerous car chases and shootings were cut as intoxicating as they were swiftly by Emile de Ruelle. The use of a steady (dialogue-free) soundtrack was also used creatively in the first part of the film. The pace of the film drops at the beginning of the second half, beginning with two rather stilted dialogue sequences, but then gains momentum again with Gypo's exciting escape and his final collision with an oncoming train and Katie's final betrayal. "