Der Gefangene

Alec Guinness got to repeat one of the roles he did on the London stage with the screen adaption of Bridget Boland's The Prisoner which was directed by Peter Glenville who also did the original stage production. It was one of Guinness's personal favorites among his parts because of the Catholicism of the actor.

In fact the role really hit close, maybe too close to home, because like the character he plays in the film, Guinness was a child of a prostitute mother who escaped into acting as a refuge from a really bad childhood. Just as his character the Cardinal of an unnamed Balkan country now ruled by a Marxist dictatorship went into the church as a way of rising above the station he was born in life.

Jack Hawkins plays the state inquisitor, a psychologist by training who probes and finds the weakness in Guinness and uses it to get a confession of treason out of him. Pride and vanity are the trickiest of human sins, we're all guilty of it in one way or another.

In making this film Guinness, Boland, and Glenville were all adamant about keeping the main character Catholic and not some Christian preacher of an unnamed denomination as what the producers originally wanted to do, the better for a broader appeal they reasoned. Catholicism and the special burdens and duties it places on its clergy is precisely what makes the story valid.

According to a recent biography of Alec Guinness though it was never going to be anyone else but him in the role of the Cardinal, Noel Willman had done the inquisitor part on stage. Several people like John Gielgud and Peter Bull were considered for that part before Hawkins was signed for the role.

If the subject matter does seem familiar, the role is obviously modeled on Josef Cardinal Mindszenty of Hungary. And director Peter Glenville would have his greatest screen triumph in Becket, the story of another troublesome priest several centuries earlier.

Guinness does lay bare his soul in this film. For fans of Alec Guinness this film is a must.

Interesting play by Bridget Boland loosely based on the notorious fake trial of Cardinal Mindszenty of Hungary after a month of brainwashing by the communists in 1948. Alec Guinness was himself a catholic and is really living out his catholicism in this great performance of the live dissection of a catholic priest, extremely actual in today's situation with the church immersed in scandals of pedophilia. Bridget Boland makes a very different story from the Mindszenty drama, making the interrogator (Jack Hawkins) an equal to the Cardinal as opponent and prosecutor and seems to be winning but actually loses in the end against the honesty of the Cardinal realizing his own futility, while the prosecutor- interrogator as a victor is the real loser and takes the consequences. Fascinating drama, which should be returned to again and again. In reality, Cardinal Mindszenty's brainwash process only lasted for less than a month and was chiefly conducted by the use of drugs and physical exhaustion. The only parallel torture that Alec Guinness is exposed to is forced insomnia. He is imprisoned for longer than three months with only private talks with the interrogator as a method and finally released, when the "state" thinks it has won by ruining his reputation and exposing him as a fraud, while Cardinal Mindszenty was sentenced for life. The film was made in 1955, the year after saw the Hungarian revolt, and Cardinal Mindszenty was then set free and lived a long life, even writing books and his memoirs. He is still one of the most important icons of Hungary and will remain so. His shrine is at the ancient basilica of Esztergom north of Budapest, a very beautiful place by the Danube.

Inspired by the plight of Catholic Cardinal Josef Mindszenty behind the Iron Curtain – already the subject of a worthwhile low-budget Hollywood film, GUILTY OF TREASON (1950; see above) – this prestigious British production (based on a Bridget Boland play, who adapts her own work for the screen) boasts two powerhouse performances by Alec Guinness (as the proud Prince of the Church) and Jack Hawkins (as the wily Interrogator). Their interaction is a beauty to behold and one cannot help but be reminded how these formidable actors had already worked together in, curiously enough, MALTA STORY (1953) and, of course, would go on to do so again under David Lean's Oscar-winning direction in THE BRIDGE ON THE RIVER KWAI (1957) and LAWRENCE OF ARABIA (1962). Although much of the running time is devoted to their rigorous one-on-one sessions (enough for it to be deemed a two-hander), the film allows (at least) another fine actor to shine: Wilfred Lawson as Guinness' jailer who grows to respect his prisoner with time. The small cast also includes Kenneth Griffith as Hawkins' eager-to-learn subordinate – incidentally, the latter also appeared in two episodes of Patrick McGoohan's later cult TV series of the same name but which bore no relation to this movie! – and Raymond Huntley as Hawkins' impatient superior. Conversely, the romantic subplot between doubting Communist Ronald Lewis and his Catholic girlfriend Jeanette Sterke seems forced and intrusive – almost like an afterthought (whereas it had been far more effectively handled in the aforementioned Hollywood treatment). But, as I said before, the film's trump card is its gradual depiction of the evolving relationship between the two leads, which really has no equivalent in GUILTY OF TREASON (where Charles Bickford's tormentors were various and generally shrouded in darkness). Although the main characters and the setting remain unnamed throughout (lending it a pretentious air of political allegory also missing from the earlier film), the controversial subject of THE PRISONER got it banned from participating in both the Cannes and Venice Film Festivals – although it did get nominated for 5 BAFTAs and, eventually, won a couple of other international awards.

Believed to be inspired by the post-war communist show trials of Cardinals Stepinac and Mindszenty this brilliant play by Bridget Boland opened in 1954, directed by Peter Glenville with a cast headed by Alec Guinness, Noel Willman and Wilfred Lawson. Glenville was entrusted with directing the film version the following year with Guinness and Lawson reprising their roles whilst Willman was replaced by Jack Hawkins.

As has been well documented it proved to be extremely controversial and was not only banned from both Venice and Cannes for fear of offending the communists but was also accused in some quarters of being anti-Catholic! Sixty-five years on of course, such 'sensitivities' seem insignificant and all that really matters now is how it stands up as a film.

Although Glenville, making an assured directorial debut, has chosen to take a few scenes outside the proscenium arch, it still remains 'filmed theatre' and is no less effective for that. It is essentially a two-hander between the Cardinal of Alec Guinness and the Interrogator of Jack Hawkins. The lighting, settings and clever camerawork have combined to make their wordy exchanges as 'filmic' as possible.

Guinness is superlative and bearing in mind his subsequent conversion to Catholicism, I would imagine that he put more of himself into this role than any other. His performance as an extremely clever man reduced to a quivering, grovelling wreck by solitary confinement and psychological torture is brave to say the least. He is very much an 'interior' actor of course and I would say that his detachment is inclined to lessen ones sympathy for his character. The casting of Jack Hawkins is a masterstroke as this character's undoubted cunning is tempered by this actor's innate sensitivity. Although he succeeds in his job of breaking the Cardinal down, disgracing him in the eyes of his followers and diminishing his spiritual power, his is a Pyrrhic victory as he too will suffer the consequences.

The playwright herself has written the screenplay and in keeping with the infernal compromises of film, has been obliged to tack on a romantic sub-plot between a prison guard and a married woman which is undeveloped and utterly superfluous.

One cannot fail to mention Wilfred Lawson as the jailer whose character has been cleverly written by Boland to provide a contrast and to fulfil the role of a Shakesperean Fool. Lawson's casting is inspired and he is simply superb.

Purely as a film, it is not without its weaknesses but is easily the best of the Guinness/Glenville collaborations. The scene that lingers longest is that in which the Interrogator observes those praying in the church and realises that although the symbol of the faith represented by the Cardinal has been tarnished, the faith itself can never be destroyed.

The Cardinal's plea:" Do not judge the priesthood by the priest" is devastatingly timeless.

For a man with such extensive Shakespearian stage experience, Alec Guinness certainly didn't show movie audiences the depth of his talent. You can catch a few movies if you know where to look, but in general, his usual fare doesn't leave a lasting impression. Perhaps that was why he donned disguises so often; maybe he feared just being himself wasn't good enough? My hypothesis notwithstanding, you must know he wasn't knighted because of his work in Star Wars. If you want to see his real talent he kept bottled up for the rest of his film career, find the forgotten drama The Prisoner.

It's a cat-and-mouse film with virtually two players: Alec Guinness and Jack Hawkins. Alec plays a cardinal arrested on suspicion of treason, and Jack plays the interrogator bent on extracting a confession. For political reasons, Jack and the men of his fictional fascist government need Alec to confess. If he dissolutions his followers, they'll be easier to control. To avoid Alec's martyrdom, Jack has to be very careful in his interrogation tactics.

Depending on your point of view of the story, either of the men could be considered the lead. With nearly equal screen time, it's a toss up. Alec is obviously the focus, as he's imprisoned and psychologically tortured; but Jack soon looks at his assignment as more than just a job and becomes obsessed with making Alec break. Both men do exactly what is asked of them in the script and show talents they didn't usually show in their other movies. Their timing, chemistry, and feed off each other's energy is very engaging, even if the genre doesn't usually appeal to you. I wasn't expecting to like the film, but I couldn't tear my eyes away. I can't count how many times I said, "I didn't know he had it in him," when Alec would scream or cry. Can you imagine Alec Guinness crying? Here at the Hot Toasty Rag, we love rewarding three types of performances: the "what does it take?" performance, the obscure performance, and the best performance of one's career. As Alec's falls in all three categories, we were very happy to honor him in 1955.