Underground

Eric Franken is a leading member of an underground network and illegal radio in wartime Berlin. He is concerned when his mother announces the return of his soldier brother Kurt. Family friend Müller is disillusioned with the death of his son in the sinking of the Bismarck. Kurt remains a militant as he berates old man Müller. Eric struggles to hide his secret life. Kurt falls for violinist Sylvia Helmuth, not realizing that she is part of the underground.

This is a straight up anti-Nazi story woven into the war. It is effective in portraying a police state although there are some unrealistic turns. I do love the funny rumor spreading of Fräulein Gessner. It is moralistic and thrilling. Kurt's berating of Müller is painful. If it has any problem, it's that there are too many people in the underground. It's more realistic and more powerful to have fewer people.

"Underground" is a good propaganda movie that came out of Warner Brothers in 1941. It's lacking major stars, but the story is certainly A list. Philip Dorn and Jeffrey Lynn star as German brothers on opposite sides. Dorn is a member of the underground, which uses a traveling illegal radio to broadcast to the people, while Lynn is a returning soldier who has lost his arm. He becomes interested in an attractive violinist, Sylvia (Kaaren Verne) who performs in a tavern, unaware that his brother knows her from the underground and that they are both members. This leads to problems as the Nazis close in.

Vincent Sherman does an excellent job of directing. The rest of the cast includes Martin Kosleck a a nasty Nazi, and Mona Maris as his assistant, also an underground member. The Dutch Dorn gives a very good performance, as does Lynn. The ending of the film is quite touching.

As someone on this site pointed out, the Germans let the Nazis come into power and didn't do much in the way of resistance. There was a strong French resistance, as well as the Yugoslav Partisans, the Polish Home Army, the Soviet partisans, the Italian CLN, the Norwegian Resistance, the Greek Resistance and the Dutch Resistance. One doesn't hear much about German resistance. Warner Brothers probably just assumed it was active.

A good movie.

This top rate production from Warners Bros., tells the story of the anti-Nazi underground and its attempts to sway the German people to reject the Nazi regime and put an end to its war machine. This film is far better than many other later anti-Nazi films cranked out by Hollywood during WW2. The cast all give top rate performances. Martin Koslec is effectively slimey as the Nazi secret police leader who is out to crush the underground. After seeing him here, no wonder he made a career portraying evil Nazi leaders. Perhaps the most memorable performance is by Wolfgang Zilzer as the sad, pathetic former underground leader who becomes a traitor in exchange for release from the hellish torture he is undergoing in a Nazi concentration camp. The scene where he is confronted by underground leaders and forced to commit suicide has real power. The lighting and the music are perfect. Seen today, this film might seem a bit optimistically naive. It gives the viewer the impression the Nazi regime would soon fall from power. None the less the film effectively portrays the terror inflicted on the German people to assure obedience to its corrupt and evil regime.

Note; One odd idea thrown in, is a suggestion about why Rudolph Hess fled Germany and flew into London. During one of the underground broadcasts, Philip Dorn states that Hess fled to escape the gestapo and tell the world the truth. This sounds a bit naive, since everything suggests in real life Hess was always a staunch supporter of the Nazi regime. Of course the whole Hess affair is still to this day shrouded in mystery, and we may never know the real reason why Hess flew into London. That, however is a matter of discussion for another forum.

Vincent Sherman was on his way up as a film director at Warner Bros. when he was assigned to 'Underground', a low-budget feature without stars to bolster its box-office appeal. Nevertheless, he managed to weave an interesting, fast-paced tale of intrigue and suspense with the Nazi menace hanging like a heavy shadow over the whole film. Basically, it's the story of two brothers torn apart by their beliefs--one (Philip Dorn) is involved in an underground movement, an announcer for a resistance radio program. The other (Jeffrey Lynn) is a loyal German soldier who eventually joins his brother's cause when he realizes what Hitler is doing. This did fairly well at the box-office despite not having big names and deserves to be seen as the forceful war melodrama that it is.

Martin Kosleck does his usual turn as a vicious Nazi officer and Mona Maris is convincing as a woman not exactly loyal to the German cause. May not be an "A" feature but it certainly is worth viewing.

Watching Underground makes me wish that TCM would do an anthology of great B-movies. Limited budgets imposed constraints on production values -- sound stages and back lots instead of locations, black & white instead of color, character actors in leading roles. What budgets didn't constrain was acting, directing and writing. And what's cool is that there were lots of them, especially from the studio system, where great talent was on staff.

I don't think I've seen a wartime propaganda flick that pulls out all the stops quite like this one. Vile Nazis in their spiffy Nazi uniforms, sadism, torture, whips, dungeons, betrayal, sabotage, righteous rants by old professors...all here! Tight production and right casting make this a delicious grand guignol. Despite the grim theme, there are some pretty funny Hogan's Heroes moments. Example: a thuggish Gestapo underling is bragging to his secretary about a ghastly new torture method he's invented and complaining about Himmler's taking the credit. The secretary, who's in the underground, replies, barely containing her sarcasm, "Don't worry, I'm sure you'll get a promotion."

And then, there's the ending, when one must face an excruciating dilemma -- to do something horrible and cruel for the greater good. It's something I don't know if I'd have the courage to do. Would you?