Flashbacks are considered to be cheap gimmicks in screenwriting. In modern movies there the technique is rarely applied. But in the movies of classic
The story begins with Claude Rains showing a group of English reporters around the English countryside. Or at least what looks like the English countryside during the day. At night all the livestock, hay and shrubbery is moved to create a miniature airbase in which Free French fighters fly missions to defeat the Nazis. Of course the reporters want to know how this all started and who is involved. So Rains starts off in flashback.
We are taken to a passenger ship in which Rains is traveling. Another traveler on the ship is the Pro-Vichy Major Duval, played by Sydney Greenstreet. On the way the ship picks up five convicts who have escaped from the French prison colony at
So we go to another flashback. Each prisoner gets his story told. We learn that all the prisoners have special skills and because of those special skills they were able to escape the colony.
The star of the movie is Humphrey Bogart, so his story is told in the most detail. It is also told in flashback, but not by Bogie himself. It is the Peter Lorre character, Marius, who does the honors. We learn that Bogie ran a small newspaper that was anti-Nazi. When the Nazi’s invaded
As we return from this flashback we are back on the ship. The ship is raided from the air by German planes. Of course Greenstreet is happy about this, but Bogie and friends come to the rescue of the ship. They shoot down the Nazi plane and Greenstreet. Everything seems great as we return to the present and Rains says the flyers are due to land soon.
When the reporters arrive, every plane has come in except for Bogie’s. The plane has been shot at and labors to the ground. There the pilot gets out, but not Bogie. Bogie has died and everyone becomes sad. The movie ends with Rains giving a patriotic eulogy.
What is more interesting than this movie is the story behind it. Of course having Claude Rains, Humphrey Bogart, Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre in the movie mean that Warner Brothers wanted to capture the chemistry of
Politics at the studio was also involved. Wallis and Jack L. Warner were on bad terms after the
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