Femmes traquées

Gregory Ratoff's Academy Award-nominated "Paris Underground" is one of the movies released immediately after WWII that took an almost absurdly heroic view of things. In this case, two women - one from the US, the other from England - are in France when the Nazis invade, and they start coming up with ways to smuggle British troops out. In this day and age it'll probably remind us of "Dunkirk", but obviously lacks the brutal realism. It's not any sort of masterpiece, but it still manages to be intense enough to hold the viewer's attention (especially the apartment scenes).

Worth seeing, if only once.

I happen to be a fan of Constance Bennett's, and also an admirer - she was not only a fine actress and a beautiful, glamorous woman, but a crackerjack businesswoman and someone who worked hard for the war effort.

Having hit 40, Bennett was no longer in demand for leads; in fact, in Two-Faced Woman, she'd had a supporting role. "Paris Underground" is a film she produced herself in England, and it's very good. It's the story of the American wife, Kitty de Mornay (Bennett) of a Frenchman (George Rigaud) who is swept into the Resistance when she's asked to help get an English flier back to London. The work excites and intrigues her so much, she decides not to leave France and instead, continues helping fliers escape. She is assisted in this by a nervous friend (Gracie Fields).

I found this a suspenseful and interesting film, and although it wasn't shot in France, some of the sets, like the baker's, were quite good. The performances are excellent. Rigaud as Kitty's husband is suave and likable; Kurt Krueger is excellent as a German officer who takes an interest in Kitty, and Gracie Fields, in her last role, though she lived until 1979, is wonderful as Kitty's friend.

This is a little known gem, and I thought it was well done.

This is much better than it seems. It appears to be a rather flimsy female travesty on "Pied Piper", two ladies in Paris getting stuck in the war and unvoluntarily becoming involved in smuggling British pilots and spies out of the country, an enterprise they carry on successfully, until they are caught and taken under treatment by the Gestapo; but the story is actually quite good, one of the ladies, the American one (Constance Bennett) being married to a Frenchman, the film starting with their quarrelling, but he plays an important part throughout the film and adds to the dramatic thriller of the finale. It is well made with a great score by Alexander Tanzman, and although much of it may seem rather petty and over-wrought with female concerns, it is worth waiting for the development of the drama.

Paris Underground (aka: Madame Pimpernell) is a solid British entry in the war/intrigue genre produced immediately after cessation of hostilities with Germany in 1945 by aging, but still glamorous, American star Constance Bennett and distributed in the United States by United Artists.

Ms. Bennett, a somewhat flighty American married to a French foreign office official, and her middle-age spinster pal Gracie Fields, while fleeing the city during the fall of Paris in 1940, find themselves by happenstance carrying a downed British aviator in the trunk of their automobile. Turned back to Paris by a German road bock, they have to take the flier back to hiding in Gracie's apartment. One of the best and most suspenseful scenes occurs when the girls have a flat with the pilot in the car's rear, and a Nazi officer stops to assist them! By hook and crook they eventually manage to smuggle the young aviator to Free France. Delighted with their success, they establish and underground railroad that eventually gets hundreds of allied airmen back to their bases. With a combination of American audacity and British pluck, these two brave and resourceful women cause the occupying Germans a big headache.

Sharply directed by Gregory Ratoff and atmospherically photographed by Lee Garmes, Paris Underground is tense, exciting, and believable. Acting by the two female leads is first rate with good support coming from Argentine actor George Rigaud as Ms. Bennett's husband, Kurt Kreuger as a suave but cruel Gestapo captain who would like to be more than friends with the ripely beautiful Ms. Bennett, and Eily Malyon as the grouchy concierge of Ms. Field's hotel. Editing is a little untidy in places, with some scenes taking too long to unfold. However, the story is never draggy, but engaging and exciting from beginning to end. Alexander Tansman's florid but stirring score, which drew an Academey Award nomination, drives the action along at a gallop.

This picture bears some resemblance to glitzier Joan Crawford vehicle Reunion In France (1942). While not up to competing head-up with that big hitter in the entertainment department, the more staid Paris Underground is somehow more believable and is an enjoyable, inspiring little potboiler in its own right for fans of the war/intrigue thriller.

Constance Bennett tells her old governess that the Germans will never take Paris, but Gracie Fields bundles her into her saloon car and they try to get out, along with an English flyer who winds up with them. However, the German infantry blocks their route and escorts them back to Bennett's home. Fortunately, her husband George Rigaud has connection with the burgeoning Underground, so it's back to the coast.... where through a mishap, the flier winds up getting away, but the women don't. Another effort to get out with another captured flier goes well.... so they decide to stay and go into the business of smuggling out fallen British fliers.

It's a beautifully written script for star Constance Bennett, as she gradually goes from a self-centered playgirl in a failing marriage to someone who actually cares and does something about it. Gracie also gives a fine performance, but it's a supporting one. She had spent five years trying to parlay her stardom in Britain into one in Hollywood. The result was four roles, good ones, but after playing love interest for Monty Woolly, and now governess to Constance Bennett (in reality six years her junior), she and husband Monty Banks decided to pack it up and return to the music halls where she was a welcome sight until the end of her days.

Miss Bennett had also reached the end of her career as a glamorous movie star. Over the next twenty years, she would appear in only seven more movies; the less revealing gaze of the television camera and stage footlights would be her professional home.