It’s another Graham Greene script. I have previously reviewed two of his movies, This Gun For Hire and The Third Man. This one came out in 1942, produced in England during the dire circumstances of World War Two. It’s about the war, and the subject is fifth columnists. The term may be strange to people who grew up after the 1940s.
Emilio Mola, a Nationalist General during the Spanish Civil War, told a journalist in 1936 that as his four columns of troops approached Madrid, a “fifth column” of supporters inside the city would support him and undermine the Republican government from within. The term was then widely used in Spain. Ernest Hemingway used it as the title of his only play, which he wrote in Madrid while the city was being bombarded, and published in 1938 in his book The Fifth Column and the First Forty-Nine Stories.
The film didn’t get much notice outside of England until much later. During those times very little came into or left England that was not essential to the war effort. This film was engineered to prop up British morale at a time when the German menace was at a peak. It’s Went the Day Well?, and it stars British actor Leslie Banks in the uncomplimentary role of a German fifth columnist. Distribution was by Ealing Studios. Images are from a showing on Turner Classic Movies, and technical details are from Wikipedia.
There are few surprises. Right up front a villager (Mervyn Johns) tells of the Battle of Bramley End. He points out the grave marker with the names of the German infiltrators who died there in the war, by then well past. The narrator’s tale is remarkably prescient, as he talks about Hitler getting his due. That event did come to pass, but nearly two and a half years after the film was released. The narrator describes how German paratroopers, disguised as British soldiers, arrived in the village in lorries (trucks).
All is bright and sunny, as the phony British troops introduce themselves as a contingent on exercises and needing to bivouac in the village.
Kommandant Orlter, alias Major Hammond (Basil Sydney), introduces himself to the Reverend Ashton (C.V. France) and Squire Oliver Wilsford (Banks). But he already knows the squire. The squire is the fifth columnist helping the Germans infiltrate the town. The vicar’s daughter is Nora Ashton (Valerie Taylor), who eventually cracks the Germans’ scheme.
The plot is cracked when an errant telegram script is used by the German troops to keep score while they are playing cards. When the script is retrieved, Nora notices curious figures on the back, written by the Germans.
Yes, that is not the way Brits write their numbers. But it is the way people on the Continent do, especially the Germans. Additionally young George Truscott (Harry Fowler) notices a chocolate bar from one of the Germans is embossed “Chokolade” and “Wien.” That’s German for chocolate and Vienna.
The jig is up. Nora alerts Squire Wilsford, who then alerts the Germans that it is time to go to plan B, which is to come out into the open and put the town under arms. Herded into the church, the townspeople are informed of their situation. Massive fire power is displayed.
The first to die is, of course, the kindly old vicar. He defies the Germans by ringing the church bell, and is gunned down.
Ominous threats menace the citizens. Resistance will be met with retribution many times over. Citizens begin to take action independently. The postmistress, Mrs. Collins (Muriel George), tosses a shaker full of ground pepper into the face of the German soldier guarding her, and then she kills him with a hatchet. For her efforts she is bayoneted by another German.
An escape attempt is foiled by the squire, who murders the escapee. The Germans announce that in response the children will be killed the following morning, Monday. The citizens begin to take action. Young George succeeds in escaping in a pouring rain with the aid of a poacher friend, who has remained hidden in the woods all this time (poaching). The poacher pulls even in a gunfight with two Germans, and George is wounded.
George gets the word out, and nearby British forces respond. Monday morning arrives, and the citizens have been isolating and annihilating individual Germans and seizing their weapons throughout the night. Now the Battle of Bramley End begins in earnest. The German infiltrators are caught between the British response force and the citizens.
Nora settles with the treacherous Squire Wilsford—a double tap with a pistol.
This is an unabashed patriotic production, designed to inspire citizens to be alert for fifth columnists. By December 1942 the Germans had for all practical purposes lost the Battle of Stalingrad, American troops had landed along with British troops in North Africa, Montgomery had defeated Rommel in the second Battle of el Alamein. Only the Germans could not see the end was in sight. The British and the Americans had won the Battle of the Atlantic, and American troops and war matériel were flowing almost unimpeded from west to east across the Atlantic.
And that is one thing wrong with this film. 1940 would have been the year to release it. In 1940 the Germans were still contemplating Operation Sealion, the invasion of the British isles across the English Channel.
A greater fault is the premise, said premise being that a single contingent of German infiltrators could so completely thwart British communications by jamming that the invasion would be successful. No other fifth column operation is mentioned in the film, itself an absurdity of magnificent proportions. Aside from that, it’s good, after more than 70 years, to be reminded of the Nazi troops being their brutish selves and getting their just rewards in the end.
This movie is worth a watch. From Wikipedia, “In 2005 it was named as one of the “100 Greatest War Films” in a Channel 4 poll in Britain:
In July 2010, StudioCanal and the British Film Institute National Archive released a restoration of the Went the Day Well? to significant critical acclaim. Tom Huddleston of Time Out (London) termed it “jawdroppingly subversive. Cavalcanti establishes, with loving care and the occasional wry wink, the ultimate bucolic English scene, then takes an almost sadistic delight in tearing it to bloody shreds in an orgy of shockingly blunt, matter-of-fact violence. When the restored film opened at Film Forum in New York City in 2011, A.O. Scott of The New York Times called it “undeservedly forgotten… [H]ome-front propaganda has rarely seemed so cutthroat or so cunning.”
If you have already seen The Eagle Has Landed with Michael Caine, Donald Sutherland and Robert Duvall, then the plot will be familiar to you.
Skeptical Analysis 