Agent Z 1

Archaic, talky but eventually gripping WWI spy thriller, with shifting loyalties and plot twists abound. Constance Bennett plays an unusually powerful female role for 1930, and she has some showstopping closeups. Erich Von Stroheim is commanding as her possible counterpart / ally / enemy. **1/2 out of 4.

I saw this movie in the early 1990s, at a screening given by William K Everson at the New School for Social Research in New York City. I usually took detailed notes during all of Mr Everson's screenings, but this time there was a disturbance in the auditorium (no, not my fault, you clever clots) and I didn't keep my notes. I can barely remember the film, which is not a point in its favour.

The action takes place during the Great War in the home of the First Lord of the Admiralty, who has the unfortunate name Sir Winston Chamberlain. (Any relation to Neville Churchill?) His butler Valdar is played by Erich von Stroheim, so it's no spoiler to report that Valdar is a spy for the Kaiser. He does everything but click his heels and wear a monocle.

Into this cosy inglenook comes Frances Hawtree ... played by Constance Bennett, who has never impressed me (except in her off-screen work on behalf of U.S. servicemen). We find out very quickly that Frances is a counterspy. She keeps reporting to Mr Yates of the Secret Service, who addresses her by her code number 'Z-1'. Which reminds me...

Most of the characters in this film are meant to be British, but the (mostly) American actors have the sense not to attempt British accents. Still, it's annoying to hear William Courtenay as Yates addressing Bennett as 'ZEE-one'. Was nobody in this production aware that in Britain the last letter of the alphabet is pronounced 'ZED'? Since Frances Hawtree and her C.O. are allegedly British, it would make sense if they got this detail right.

The film's title is a code phrase that doesn't seem to mean anything in clear. At one point, one of the male characters needs a pretext to leave the room, so he says he has to fetch his pipe ... but the pipe is a mere sham. That's as good as this gets.

I was impressed with the performance of the character actor who played Sir Winston. He gave several good performances in the early talkie era, and he deserves to be better known. Unfortunately, his name was William Holden: the same name as the later Oscar-winning leading man. Although there was a seven-year gap between the end of the older Holden's screen career and the beginning of the younger Holden's, I've seen several references which confuse the two, crediting all of the senior Holden's films to his younger and better-known namesake. Here, the senior Holden speaks his dialogue in his own natural American accent, yet he does an impressive job of conveying a proper upper-class Englishman.

Director Roy Del Ruth also deserves to be better known, but this is not one of his better efforts. I don't remember this film very well, but the fact that I *don't* remember much of it is evidence that it wasn't very good. Even von Stroheim is subdued, for once. I'll go out on a limb and rate it 5 out of 10, largely for William Holden's fine performance.

Adapted from a successful play, "Three Faces East" is a clever spy thriller set during WWI. Constance Bennett plays the role of Frances Hawtree aka Agent Z-1, undercover spy for the German Intelligence Service. She is assigned to infiltrate the estate of Sir Winston Chamberlain--First Lord of the Admiralty--and meet with her contact there, where her mission will be explained.

The mansion is populated with a butler of ambiguous intentions named Valdar (Erich von Stroheim), two maids, Lady Chamberlain, their son Arthur, and two members of Chamberlain's staff.

I found the very beginning of the film to be overly dramatic, but the story quickly becomes more believable, and more interesting, when Frances arrives at the Chamberlain estate. What follows is a cat and mouse game, with twists and turns to keep the viewer guessing. The contents of Lord Chamberlain's safe may hold the key to victory in Europe. Try to guess the truth as alliances change and the lines between romance and duty become blurred.

The acting is fine and Erich von Stroheim is delightful. The script is tightly written, moving along at a brisk pace.

I am a huge Constance Bennett fan, and I have two great stories about her that I'll put at the end of the review. "Three Faces East" is from 1930, based on a play, and directed by Roy del Ruth.

Bennett plays a British agent in World War I. She is sent to London to capture a major German spy named Blecher. While staying in the house of one of the government heads near London, she realizes that the butler (von Stroheim) is a German agent, so she identifies herself as one to gain his confidence. He falls for her. He explains to her that the safe needs to be broken into nightly to see the movement of troops. Then one of the sons in the family returns home (she is supposedly the girlfriend of the other son), and he remembers seeing her during one of the conflicts, working as a nurse. Meanwhile, the butler comes under suspicion as a spy, and the circumstances become complicated.

Early sound films like this are often stilted affairs, as this one is, with people over-enunciating (Bennett seems to do this) and speaking more slowly than necessary so that the dialogue has no rhythm. It's almost comical, with the son referring to his parents as Mater and Pater. Today the acting seems overdone in spots, but that was the style; after all, a lot of the talkies actors came from the stage.

My two Constance Bennett stories: one from David Niven, who said that she was so beautiful that she could go into a room in the evening, play cards all night, come out of the room at 6 a.m. and look exactly the same. I believe it.

The other story is a funny one from one of her husbands, who nearly died while drowning. He and Bennett were divorced, but he claimed that Constance saved his life. While drowning, he had an image of her in black, sobbing, and saying, "My poor Henri," very dramatically, and garnering lots of sympathy. He said to himself, "I'm not going to let her get away with it," and managed to save himself.

All in all, "Three Faces East" is a real antique. It was remade with Boris Karloff in 1940.

While it is true that not all of these very old early talkies, are wonderful, they are still enjoyable. The picture quality is very high, I did not find the sound to be bad. It is a great opportunity to see how motion pictures are progressing. The fact that this movie was released two weeks after my father was born, and he lived 90 years provided an additional incentive for me. What is also fascinating to me is to see and hear actors born in 1862 on screen. 1862 Lincoln was president. I believe this is worth your time. A spy/counter spy movie circa WWI? And yes, she is beautiful.