Courrier diplomatique

Tyrone Power is a diplomatic courier for the US State Department who gets into more trouble than he bargained for.

Always a very good if under-rated actor,in "Diplomatic Courier" Tyrone Power shows a tough shrewdness that's more gritty private eye than State Department protocol calls for.

The movie, in beautifully photographed black-and-white, never lets up its rapid pace. It's the sort of impeccably produced Hollywood movie that is absolutely professional, from the smart direction of Henry Hathaway to the breathtaking cinematography by Lucien Ballard.

As a diplomatic courier, Power thinks himself as just "a postman." But when he's called upon to make a special delivery, things begin happening and fast.

For starters, he finds himself in the sights of not one, but two beautiful women --{Patricia Neal and Hildegard Neff -- who both deliver terrific and intelligent performances.)

Much of the action takes place on one of those international trains equipped with piercing air horns and whistles, with lots of hopping between compartments. There is also the requisite plush hotel and nightclub with a weird variety act, and packs of sinister Eastern European-accented characters up to no good.

With all of this, there is a marvelous bonus: four future stars appear in "Diplomatic Courier," and you might want to look for them: Michael Ansara...Charles Bronson... Lee Marvin ... and Karl Malden. Bronson, Ansara and Marvin have tiny roles -- Bronson (Buchinsky here) and Ansara are in and out in seconds -- but Karl Malden actually steals the movie as a Sgt. Bilko-type US Army non-com who knows the ropes.

In all, "Diplomatic Courier" is a nice surprise, especially if you like to watch for new stars on the horizon.

I SAW THIS MOVIE IN THE 50s, but I remember that it was well played by Tyrone Power and Hildegarde Neff, with solid direction and good B&W photography.Charles Bronson ( uncredited ), had only a few seconds on the screen, but I remember vividly that he made a tremendous impression, and I was sure he would attain stardom.

Tyrone Power is obviously, as the title suggests, a diplomatic courier. He is thrown into a new mission just after completing one and changes planes before he is given time to turn around. Exhausted, he promptly falls asleep, taking two seats, but Patricia Neal, the last one on, needs it and he ultimately sleeps on her shoulder.

Right off the bat, they hit it off and have great chemistry. He would love to spend time with her, but he has his mission. This is a thoroughly engrossing espionage film that is a lot of fun and moves at a break-neck pace, with Ty constantly chasing the "bad guys" or being chased by them. Hildegarde Neff is great in a supporting role.

I'm sure this is hard to find. (I taped it some time ago off Fox Movie Channel, and recently watched it.) But if you happen to catch it, you'll be very glad you did. Costarring Stephen MacNally and Karl Malden and with James Coburn and Charles Bronson in small roles, this is one good little film that should be discovered.

Absolutely loved the premise, and when espionage thrillers are done well they are intriguing and enthralling. Henry Hathaway was a gifted director, especially in the Western genre, not everything he did was great ('The Black Rose' for example is a strange film) but when on form his films were great. The cast are also talented, including late career Tyrone Power relatively against type and Lee Marvin, Karl Malden and Charles Bronson pre-stardom.

'Diplomatic Courier' turned out to be a very good film. Not quite great or perfect, but with several fantastic elements and the things that had me worried as to whether they would work (Power for example) did do. It is always interesting when Hathaway does something different from the Western genre that he was best known for and he did show that he was at ease in other genres too, 'Kiss of Death' for example proved that and so does 'Diplomatic Courier'.

Personally do not agree with anybody that says that Power is bland or looks lost. To me the weakest performance came from a rather hammy Malden that jars a bit with the more serious tone of the film.

Would also have liked more development to Patricia Neal's role and more screen time for her. There is the odd bit of credibility straining.

However, Power did a good job on the whole. It is not his usual type of role, am most familiar with him in adventure and swashbucklers, but he does have presence and the weariness works for the role, didn't think he looked lost at all. Neal is wonderfully vampish and really makes the most of her role. Marvin and Bronson show that they had charisma, intensity and big potential pre-stardom. My favourite performance actually came from Hildegarde Neff in understated and touching form.

Furthermore, Hathaway directs expertly and with a real feel for atmosphere. Which has a lot of subtle tension. The story is intricate but not confusing and always engrosses, while the script is clever without being too talky. The score doesn't overbear and at least sounds like Sol Kaplan knew what kind of film he was writing for. 'Diplomatic Courier' looks great, very beautifully and atmospherically photographed with a lot of style and the use of actual locations works in its favour considerably.

In summation, very good and well worth watching. 8/10

This is a superb espionage film set early in the Cold War. Tyrone Power makes the perfect lead, because he always had that quality of looking innocent and puzzled in the trickiest of situations, inevitably summoning plenty of noble resolution while never looking worldly wise about it. In this story, he is a diplomatic courier working for the American State Department. It is his job to carry important diplomatic communications by hand from country to country. He carries them in a briefcase handcuffed to his wrist. He wears two watches at once, one for the time at home and one for the time of his destination. However, Power becomes embroiled in a fantastically complicated espionage affair and ends up being used as a pawn in a complex game of intrigue which few can understand. He become involved with two mysterious women, who may or may not be femmes fatale. One is Patricia Neal, who plays a wealthy American widow on the make. She comes across as too good to be true, and for a while we suspect her of overacting. But then her true nature comes out, and we discover how evil she really is. When she starts playing her character's true self, she is terrifying. The other mysterious woman is played by the German actress Hildegard Neff, a mysterious beauty who was at the peak of her American popularity at this time. The film also features Karl Malden in a supporting role, where he is particularly good and shows the promise of his career which was to come. Much of the film is shot in Trieste, which one of the characters describes as being a hotbed of spies of all kinds, like Lisbon during the War. This film has a great deal of postwar atmosphere and suspense and is only one notch down from the more brilliant works of Hitchcock and Carroll Reed. The director was Henry Hathaway, an old pro who could make the telephone book look interesting, The film is full of double agents, betrayal, duplicity, baffling situations, and murder. The film moves at quite a pace and is never dull for a moment. The availability of this classic now on DVD is a welcome addition to the finer cinematic portrayals of early Cold War paranoia and deception. It is interesting historically as well as cinematically, and we get to see a lot of location shots which evoke the era.