I'm going to have to revise my opinion of Robert Stevenson as director - not that I particularly had one it's just all those Disney credits made me kind of dismiss him. But his work really holds up - including the Disneys, and this interesting, beautifully shot war tale. It was made around the time of the American entry into World War Two but doesn't have the hysteria and breast-beating of other films from that period.
The basic set up is solid - five RAF pilots are shot down in occupied France and have to get home. The pilots don't feel terribly English - the only two we get to know well are Paul Henreid, as a Free Frenchman, and Alan Ladd, as a member of the gang who is mortally wounded.
It's a showy role for Ladd, who is pudgy faced and smiling. He's called "Baby", and appears and the beginning, getting shot as they escape; he then comes back to die around the two-thirds mark in a touching scene that drew him attention at the beginning of his career.
Laird Cregar is in top form as the villain, though the part isn't as big and I would've liked it. Thomas Mitchell isn't that convincing as a French priest. Michele Morgan was only in her early 20s when she played the woman who becomes martyred for the cause; I'm not a massive fan of her or Henreid which stopped me from enjoying this film as much as I probably would have. They kept speaking softly all the time and there were too many scenes of people walking around in the fog and whispering, as opposed to action.
It gets props for its atmosphere - this was in the early days of the war, so the Germans are very much on top. Fighting is a dangerous, deadly business. Yet it's also slightly dream-like and ethereal - like a Val Lewton film. An interesting, flawed war movie.
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