As some may well have noticed from this blog’s Friday Night/Weekend Movie strand that I have a liking for British war films. Mostly these concern World War II but occasionally I’ll look at a British movie about a different conflict, such as this week’s movie The Spy In Black (1939) which is set in 1917 a year before the end of World War One.
The premise of the movie, which is Michael Powell and Emric Pressburger’s first outing as a film making team, concerns an attempt by the Imperial German Navy to attack British naval shipping anchored at Scapa Flow in the Orkney Islands. The plan is a good one which is to get the spy onto the Orkney’s (which is difficult in wartime due to security restrictions) and then meet up with a pro-German British traitor or two in order to find out the exact time when the Royal Naval fleet in Scapa Flow will be moving from their sheltered waters. The German’s plan to attack the fleet with U-Boats when they leave dealing a heavy blow to the Royal Navy.
I’m not going to leave you with any spoilers but I’ll just say that this is a movie with a lot of twists and turns with surprises all around and a satisfying ending.
This movie is very well shot and directed, as one could expect from a Powell and Pressburger movie with the soundtrack by Miklos Rozka and Muir Mathieson being perfectly appropriate for this movie.
This movie is somewhat of a hidden gem as many people might be familiar with Powell and Pressburger through their later works such as ‘A Matter Of Life And Death’ but may be unfamiliar with ‘The Spy In Black’ which was also known in some film markets as ‘U-Boat 29’. However it ‘s well worth a watch and shows in its construction the great talents of those who made it.
Here's the link to the movie. I hope you enjoy it as much as I did.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9AAiZzxqGRM