Paris Underground
| Movie | |
|---|---|
| Original title | Paris Underground |
| Country of production | United States |
| original language | English |
| Publishing year | 1945 |
| length | 97 minutes |
| Rod | |
| Director | Gregory Ratoff |
| script |
Boris Ingster Gertrude Purcell |
| production | Constance Bennett |
| music | Alexandre Tansman |
| camera |
Lee Garmes Edward Cronjager |
| cut | James E. Newcom |
| occupation | |
| |
Paris Underground is an American thriller from 1945 set during the German occupation of France. Directed by Gregory Ratoff , it starred Constance Bennett , who also produced the film, as well as Gracie Fields and Kurt Kreuger . The novel of the same name, published in 1943, came from the hands of Etta Shiber.
action
When the Wehrmacht arrived in Paris in 1940, the French diplomat André de Mornay and his American wife Kitty had a heated argument about their alleged infidelity. The somewhat light-hearted and boisterous Kitty vigorously rejects Andrés allegations. Furious, she leaves the marital property and temporarily nests with Emmyline, known as Emmy, Quayle, her former English governess. But she is on the move, as she does not want to fall into the hands of the (German) enemy as an Englishwoman. After some thought, Kitty decides to join Emmyline. Since half of Paris is on the run, the two get caught in a sea of people and vehicles. In order to get ahead, it is decided to use secret routes, but the two women come to a German ban. The women are ordered to return to Paris immediately. Kitty then seeks refuge with an old friend, the clergyman Monseigneur Renard, who takes in Kitty and Emmy. Renard confesses to the two that he secretly also found a British pilot named Lt. William Gray, who should never fall into the hands of the Germans.
The resourceful Kitty offers to help Gray evade the Germans by hiding him in the back of her car and taking him to Paris, where she hopes her diplomatic friends will help him further. On the way, a tire in Kitty's car was blown and a German patrol led by Captain Kurt von Weber drove by. Since the handsome Wehrmacht officer likes Kitty, von Weber insists on changing the tire and accompanies her back to Emmy's house. After the Germans leave, Kitty and Emmy Gray hide in Emmy's four walls. Seven days later, Gray is still there when Kitty was unable to get help. Knowing that the Germans will kill anyone who helps the enemy, Gray announces that he will leave the two women in order not to endanger them further. At that moment, the Gestapo begins to search the houses in the street and also request entry into Emmy's accommodation. Kitty hides Gray in the fireplace Gray. At this moment help approaches, of all people from the unsuspecting Captain Weber, who wants to pay his respects to Kitty with flowers in hand and scares away the Gestapo men. Noticing Emmy's nervousness, Kitty suggests that the German accompany him to an evening dance so that Emmy can take care of Gray's disappearance from her house. By chance, Kitty's husband André is having his evening meal there at the same time and senses the distress in which she finds herself. In an unnoticed moment, André promises to help her and the next day he can arrange for Kitty, Emmy and Gray to be smuggled into the currently vacant Vichy France. But before all three can disappear, Emmy is picked up by the Gestapo for questioning, and Kitty and Gray have to go on their own first. Kitty therefore decides to return to Paris alone to help Emmy.
Kitty, who had promised her husband to return to the USA, finally changes her mind. She participates in a secret system by which refugees and Allied soldiers stranded in occupied France receive messages and begins to work as a courier. One day Kitty receives three letters, including one from a father named Dominique. After questioning the priest and being convinced he is believable, Kitty and Emmy take them to the secret basement of his church, where he has hidden a large group of Allied soldiers. By drawing lots, two soldiers are prepared for an escape. They are then hidden in Kitty's car to be taken to the baker Tissier. There they have to find out that the man has just been shot by the Germans. Kitty develops a plan with which the men are to be brought out of the danger zone as part of a funeral procession in order to take them across the river to the Vichy area. With the help of the local undertaker, Kitty's plan succeeds. Kitty and Emmy, meanwhile become patriotic accomplices of the French, do not take the opportunity to get themselves to safety, but decide to go back to Paris and work there for the Resistance in the underground.
Two years later. Frustrated that they have hardly got their hands on an enemy pilot so far, the Germans plan to use a fake Allied pilot, a spy. He should look for help underground and thereby let the underground movement rest. The alleged Brit calls himself Lt. Commander Stowe and arrives at Emmy's antique shop via the escape network. But Emmy is suspicious when he calls a certain tea biscuit a coffee biscuit. At that moment she receives a call in a voice on the other end of the line that sounds very excited. Emmy learns that this Stowe must be a German agent. Stowe wraps himself up and calls the Gestapo headquarters. Emmy then knocks him down with a candlestick and kills him. Emmy immediately rushes to her house to warn Kitty. Kitty's husband, who has long been reconciled with his wife, has also met there. Before all three can escape from the building, Hauptmann von Weber and his men storm the building. Kitty and André manage to escape into the cellar, where they hide under the coals, but Emmy is arrested. Weber, beside himself that Kitty has fooled him in such a way, does not suspect that André is also present. The German doesn't want to leave until Kitty has been caught. In order to at least save her husband, she beats André down and surrenders. After a year in Gestapo prison, Emmy and Kitty experience their liberation in 1944 and tear into each other's arms. For their brave underground work, they are honored by liberated France with medals, which André pinned to their swollen chests.
Production notes
Paris Underground , a product of the end of World War II, was created between January 8 and early March 1945 and premiered on October 19, 1945. There was no German showing of the film.
Film composer Alexander Tansman received an Oscar nomination for his cinema music. The film constructions come from Nicolai Remioff and Victor Greene . Gilbert Adrian designed Constance Bennett's costumes.
Reviews
Bosley Crowther wrote in The New York Times : “We'd love to report this morning. that Miss Bennett's sense of theater has improved, that her taste has increased. But fairness and openness prohibit this. Despite the label on her new film and the fact that it is based on a story of the French resistance as told in Etta Shiber's book, the flick turns out to be yet another adventure with a glamor girl - a glamor girl in the occupied Paris, which is not very tastefully (chosen) for such a story. "
The Movie & Video Guide called the film a "well-acted story."
Halliwell's Film Guide found the film to be "an artificial and not particularly exciting patriotica."
Individual evidence
- ^ Review in: The New York Times of October 20, 1945
- ^ Leonard Maltin : Movie & Video Guide, 1996 edition, p. 992
- ^ Leslie Halliwell : Halliwell's Film Guide, Seventh Edition, New York 1989, p. 872
Web links
- Paris Underground on Turner Classic Movies
- Paris Underground in the Internet Movie Database (English)