Dawn

Sybil Thorndike's depiction of heroic WWI nurse Edith Cavell is so reserved that it's sometimes difficult to perceive her character's compassion in Herbert Wilcox's biopic. Probably the only film in history in which the heroes discuss their plans for smuggling escaped POWs out of the country while doing their knitting. Wilcox remade the film 10 years later with his wife Anna Neagle in Thorndike's role.

The notorious case of the English nurse Edith Cavell, who was executed by the German invaders of Belgium during the First World War, because she helped retreating allied soldiers to evade capture, was the basis for this film, which was (incredibly) banned in Britain.

As a viewing of the film seems unlikely to all but a privileged minority of archival professionals, the original 'Book-of-the-film' may still be obtained from second-hand booksellers to give some idea of its approach to the subject. It is:

Dawn / by Reginald Berkeley. - London : The London Book Co., 1928] - The Novel Library.

This novelization of the film is 240 pages in length, and includes 8 production stills.

In 1914 nurse Edith Cavell (Sybil Thorndike) works in a Brussells care home when World War I breaks out. Through the war she uses the home as a cover helping 210 British PoWs escape from the Germans back home to England before she is caught.

Adapted from the play by Reginald Berkeley, Herbert Wilcox's film perfectly captures the heroism of Nurse Edith Cavell led by a superb and rare early performance by stage actress Thorndike. Ada Bodent appears as herself as one of the Belgian citizens who helped Cavell.

Edith Cavell was the daughter of an Anglican parson. After nursing her father, she became a professional nurse, and was instrumental in establishing that profession in Belgium, For the better part of the first year of the Great War, she helped British and French soldiers cross enemy lines from Belgium into France. Eventually she was caught, tried, and sentenced to death by a military tribune. The night before her death, she said "Patriotism is not enough. I must have no hatred or bitterness towards anyone." Edith Cavell was shot by a firing squad on October 12, 1915.

Those are the bare facts of Miss Cavell's life. After the War, her remains were buried at Norwich Cathedral, and her day on the Anglican Calendar of Saints is October 12. There are memorials to her throughout England, the best known near Trafalgar Square.

There were four films released about her during the War. Although I have seen none of them, I don't doubt they all had a strong propaganda message. There is a message in this movie, directed by Henry Wilcox and starring Sybil Thorndike. The message is that war is a terrible machine that grinds good people in its gears.

Miss Thorndike plays Miss Cavell like an irresistible battleship. She only allows emotions to show through on a very few occasions: with wounded men, with the Anglican priest the night before her execution and, subtly, with a soldier who refuses to fire on her at her execution. She is given no backstory. She just appears, does her thing, and disappears from the film as the soldiers prepare to shoot at her. It's an interesting choice.