I watched "The River Line" on German TV in the second half of the 1980s, but the film made such a great impression on me that I remember it perfectly to this day. The plot takes place in 1944 France. American pilot Philip (Fritz Wepper) is shot down but found by a resistance group. In the neighborhood, Philip meets the British major called "Reiher" (Peter van Eyck), who claims to have fled a German prison camp. Philip and the people from the resistance group suspect "Reiher" to be a German spy. The film is rather slow-paced; what seems more important is what the war has done and continues to do to people. Camera work is excellent and compelling. The images of the winter landscapes and hiding places are photographed in a correspondingly matter-of-fact and restrained manner. There is also a poetry in the early winter mornings, dried weeds, the hostile harshness of the forests, and huddled and frozen German soldiers. The photos emphasize the meaning of this story: how war changes a multidimensional human being into a soldier who understands only the words friend and enemy. Add to it the electrifying performances of young Fritz Wepper and Peter van Eyck, and you will get a great movie that you are not likely to forget.
