Nurse Edith Cavell

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Movie
Original title Nurse Edith Cavell
Nurse Edith Cavell (1939) 1.jpg
Country of production United States
original language English
Publishing year 1939
length 98 minutes
Rod
Director Herbert Wilcox
script Michael Hogan
production Herbert Wilcox
RKO Radio Pictures Inc.
music Anthony Collins
camera FA Young
Joseph H. August
cut Elmo Williams
occupation

Nurse Edith Cavell is a 1939 American film. Directed by Herbert Wilcox , Anna Neagle plays the British nurse Edith Cavell , who was executed for helping Allied soldiers escape during the German occupation of Belgium in World War I.

The film is based on Reginald Berkeley 1928 in New York published story Dawn ( Dawn ). The politician and writer served as a captain in a rifle brigade during the First World War.

action

When the First World War broke out, the English nurse Edith Cavell ran a nursing home in Brussels . The city is by the Germans occupied . Together with Madame Rappard, Cavell helps her grandson Jean, who was able to escape from a prison camp , to escape to the neutral Netherlands , where he is safe for the time being. Jean's father, one of her patients, had died shortly before. Affected not only by Jeans misery, Cavell joins an underground organization together with Madame Rappard and Madame Moulin, a good friend, as well as Countess de Mavon, to help Belgian, French and English soldiers to escape. Little by little, the women manage to perfect their system more and more and thereby enable many men to flee across the border.

When the German occupation finds out, measures are immediately taken to prevent further action. Lieutenant Schultz from the German army is smuggled under the prisoners, who then pretends to be an escaped prisoner. When the women help him escape to Holland, their network is exposed, and Edith Cavell and other people from the underground group are tried in a German military court . She is accused of having committed a crime to the detriment of the German armed forces, in particular bringing soldiers to the German enemy, is highly condemnable.

Despite urgent requests from all sides and warnings that an execution of the nurse would trigger worldwide outrage, the Germans were not deterred and sentenced Edith Cavell to death. She was shot on October 12, 1915.

Production and Background

Shooting for the film began in mid-May and lasted until June 24, 1939. Nurse Edith Cavell premiered in the United States on September 1, 1939 in New York, and on September 29 it was generally shown in American cinemas.

The film was preceded by a note in which one thanked the relatives of Miss Cavell and other people, as well as the Imperial War Museum in London for the documents made available. Then it was pointed out that the film was based on the true story of a British nurse who was shot by a German firing squad in Brussels in 1915.

According to later sources, the actor Fernand Visele, who played a butler in the film, was imprisoned in the cell next to Edith Cavell in St. Gilles . In May 1939, the Hollywood Reporter read that the National Council for the Prevention of War viewed the portrayal in the film as an unfriendly gesture towards Germany . The film premiered the week World War II began. According to the criticism in the journal of the industry, the Variety , as well as the English writer and the producer Herbert Wilcox, it was established that the film could be produced in Hollywood at all.

further films
With his new film adaptation under the title Nurse Edith Cavell , Herbert Wilcox made a remake of his 1928 film.

criticism

Referring to Willcox's 1928 film, Frank S. Nugent of the New York Times felt that this version was unlikely to unleash as much controversy as the previous silent film about which the German ambassador spoke to British Foreign Secretary Sir Austen Chamberlain outraged and demanded his removal. The critic confirmed that Wilcox, in his second edition of the story of Edith Cavell with Anna Neagle in the title role , tells objectively, not incontinently and deeply concerned about her heroism under the influence of an overwhelming war machine. The conclusion of the film is emphasized with the words spoken by Edith Cavell: "I have realized that patriotism is not enough, I must neither feel hatred nor bitterness towards anyone."

Awards

1940 was Anthony Collins for his music to Nurse Edith Cavell in the category "Best Original Soundtrack" for an Oscar nomination, but had to Herbert Stothart and his music for the musical film The Wizard of Oz to give way.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Nurse Edith Cavell (1939) Script info at TCM - Turner Classic Movies
  2. ↑ Nurse Edith Cavell (1939) Original Print Information at TCM - Turner Classic Movies
  3. ^ Nurse Edith Cavell (1939) at IMDb. Retrieved January 14, 2014.
  4. ↑ a b Nurse Edith Cavell (1939) Notes at TCM - Turner Classic Movies
  5. ^ Frank S. Nugent: Nurse Edith Cavell (1939) In: The New York Times, September 22, 1939. Retrieved January 14, 2014.