The Lady Vanishes done again – same writers, female lead, setting, model work and support characters. No Hitchcock but there’s Carol Reed handling the duties. It’s not as good but it’s still fun.
The story has more of a real world setting, with Nazi Germany precisely specified as the baddy – there is a prologue which goes for a couple of minutes establishing the nastiness of the Nazis as they march into Czechoslovakia (cue lot of stock footage). Lady Vanishes was a lark but this has a very serious side, with concentration camps, and Nazis and invading Poland, so it’s not as much fun.
The very British Margaret Lockwood plays the daughter of a Czech scientist who winds up in a concentration camp – at one stage she’s got this grumpy expression at one of the guards, and you can sense Esther the future of The Wicked Lady. But to be honest Lockwood doesn’t have that much to do here, certainly not as much as she did in Lady Vanishes. Most of the hero duties are carried by Rex Harrison as a jolly good nitwit who is actually a British agent – the character is very much in the vein of Michael Redgrave in Lady Vanishes and you can imagine Redgrave playing this part (he even has a musical connection). Actually that’s not fair on Harrison – he was a wonderful egotistical quality which adds a lot of spark to his part here.
Anyway Lockwood escapes from the camp but then 30 minutes in the Nazis get both her and her scientist father back and Harrison goes after them – you could have started the film here. They don’t actually get on the train until 50 minutes in – which is when Caldicott and Charters appear. (One of them buys a copy of Mein Kampf at a railway book store for something to read when they can’t get Punch; the only other thing available is Gone With the Wind.)
This takes too long to get going, Lockwood doesn’t have enough to do, the support characters aren’t as strong (apart from the dynamic duo), and there is a saggy section in the middle.
But there are some good things: Paul Henreid makes a strong, worthy villain (great twist 15 minutes in when he’s revealed to be a Nazi – the eye exam stuff is clever too); Caldicott and Charters are funny and I like the way they put Harrison in mortal danger then get him out again; Harrison is very engaging; there is plenty of action at the end including a shoot-out on a cable car.
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