49th parallel

June 11 movie: 49th Parallel. Really interesting war movie by Michael Powell about a crew of Nazis who come over on a submarine and end up in Canada. Made during the time after the war had begun, before the US had gotten involved. And I have to say, here in the US we have this jingoistic idea that Europe was helpless against the Nazis until we rode in and saved the day for them. And certainly, the American contribution to the Allies was invaluable. But I think we tend to forget that we stayed out of the war until we were forced in, and we also forget that our neighbors to the north got into the war much sooner. (Actually I don't know enough about Canadian history to know if they were compelled to treat an attack on the UK as an attack against themselves. Still, the Canadians did join WWII years before we did.)

So anyway, this movie is about a crew of five Germans who get separated from their sub and stranded on Canadian soil. The purpose of the movie is to reach out to isolationists in the US and encourage pro-war sentiment. Though they do a good job of softpedaling the message, and (mostly) keeping the movie from getting too preachy. Most of the movie is a sort of travelogue as the Nazis make their way across Canada. It's structurally interesting because the Germans are the one constant in the movie: the Canadian characters pass in and out of the movie as the Germans move on across the country. The Germans mostly seem like decent guys who happen to be on the wrong side, except the one officer is a Nazi true believer.

There are a few stars: Laurence Olivier, Leslie Howard and Raymond Massey all play Canadians who interact with the Germans. My favorite actor was Niall MacGinniss as a German whose encounter with a simple religious community (similar to the Mennonites) makes him question his purpose in being there.

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