AGAINST THE WIND (1948)

In London during World War II, Father Elliott (Robert Beatty) is recruited to join a group of people trained to parachute behind enemy lines and assigned to collect information and perform acts of sabotage. We see Elliott go through training and meet his fellow agents to be assigned work in Belgium: the lovely young Belgian radio operator Michele (Simone Signoret); Scotty, the explosives expert (Gordon Jackson); the crusty old pro Max; Jacques, who is given the false identity of a British fascist who wants to work with the Nazis; and Emile, who has spent time in a concentration camp. There’s also Andrew, a master spy who warns them what to expect: don't panic, don't express emotion even if you see a fellow agent carted off by the Gestapo, keep your suicide pill handy even if you think you'd never use it. Like Chekhov's rule about a gun (if you show it in the first act, someone had better use it in the third act), these things will all crop up for our agents. One batch of spies goes over and blows up a records office, and when Andrew is captured by the Gestapo, the second batch is sent to get him out of prison, not realizing that one of their number is a traitor.

The first half of this is occasionally difficult to get through as it mostly functions as background and exposition with very little tension and no espionage. A number of characters are introduced rather quickly, and though the priest is our access point to this group, he ultimately is not a terribly important character. The film works best when it concentrates on Michele and Scotty—he develops a crush on her and she has to let him down easy, though later she may regret that. Both are quite attractive people; it was a surprise to see Jackson looking so young as I know him mostly as the butler Hudson in the 1970s Upstairs Downstairs. The acting all around is fairly low-key as befits the film's quasi-documentary style—which is largely abandoned about a half-hour in. The only other actor who was familiar to me was James Robertson Justice as one of the spy recruiters. Some scenes are carried off very well. Emile (John Slater) has his face changed through plastic surgery and is hurt when he tries to sneak off to see his wife and she doesn't recognize him. Signoret has a very effective scene when she gets the news about the traitor. Eventually, tension builds nicely as the plan for freeing Andrew goes awry and new plans must be made. If you make it through the first half—which is not bad, just slow—you'll be rewarded with a strong second half. Pictured are Jackson, Andrew Blackett, and Signoret. [TCM]