Voice in the Wind

I tried to get some interest in this movie, very atmospheric but so boring, talkative, a film where you wonder what the story leads to without having any satisfaction. It's not Francis Lederer's fault, just the overall story and maybe directing too. Art Ripley made something far better fourteen years later with THUNDER ROAD, a real must see, cult movie, starring Bob Mitchum. You can try it anyway.

I saw this film at least six times. I grew up a fan of Francis Lederer and I am also a musician. This film was premiered by my uncle at the Hawaii Theater in Hollywood. It was unique in more than one way: Not only was it an intensive dramatic story of a pianist who tries to recover from abuse by the Nazis, but elegantly portrays nationalism. The Moldau by Smetana is the background music which holds the film together. Keep in mind that I saw the film in the 1940s, and not since; perhaps no one has since. Another uniqueness: my uncle managed to bring a pianist on stage; he began playing the Moldau and it bled into the film music. The pianist, as I recall, was Vladimir Brenner, who sought to restore a career after the war. I do not know if other theaters included an on-stage pianist. Critics suggest the film was moody, even dull, but I found it then, as I remember it now, a film classic.

As a teenager I rarely saw a movie I didn't like, but this was the first one I actually hated. I saw it in 1944 at a naval base in Newfoundland after months of isolation in the North Atlantic, so what few critical facilities I had were numbed and I was ready to enjoy any junk Hollywood threw my way. But this... I walked out of the theater actually angry!

So how come it still sticks in my memory? Nothing could be that memorably bad. I suspect from reading other reviews that it had many haunting, persistent film-noir images unlike anything the major studios were grinding out then.

If it ever shows up on Turner Classic Movies I'll certainly watch it with an eager, open mind.

Jan Volny (Francis Lederer) is a concert pianist who has ended up on the island of Guadelupe. He had a lover Marya (Sigrid Gurie) and they both fled the Nazi occupation of their homeland and have ended up in Guadelupe unaware of each other's presence there. Jan has lost his memory and can't speak and lives as a vagrant. He still plays the piano, in particular, a tune that was banned by the Nazis and is a symbol of Czech patriotism. Marya is living a few doors away from him and is dying of pneumonia. She hears him playing this particular tune and is drawn towards the sound. However, she collapses and dies in the street - he finds her and slowly begins to remember who she is...... meanwhile, there are a couple of smuggler brothers Angelo (Alexander Granach) and Luigi (J Carrol Naish) who have fallen out over Jan as they blame him for setting fire to their boat......

The quality of this film is poor and the pace is slow. Its an atmospheric film that is told in flashback and its basically a depressing melodrama. The music score is very good and the moments when Jan plays the piano are the best moments in the film. Another good moment comes when Jan tells the Nazi interrogating officer what he thinks of him. Unfortunately, this leads to his head injury and subsequent amnesia. I'm not sure whether its a good film or not.

After playing Smetna's Maldau in Czechoslovakia, and accused of inciting anti-German feelings, pianist Jan Volny finds himself running from the Nazis in "Voice in the Wind" from 1944. This is a rarity - it's an independent film at a time when very few were made, due to the power of the movie studios.

Volny is tortured by the Nazis and sent to a concentration camp; however, he overpowers his captors and later boards a ship for Guadalupe. There he is known as El Hombre -- he has amnesia and remembers nothing of his past.

His wife, whom he left in the care of a friend in Czechoslovakia, finally lands in Guadalupe as well, but she is quite ill. She hears El Hombre playing the piano and realizes that it is Jan.

Very sad and depressing but full of heart and the human spirit.