Week Eighty-Six
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| "Confessions of a Nazi Spy" 1939 |
MOVIE NAME: CONFESSIONS OF A NAZI SPY
STUDIO: WARNER BROTHERS
EXECUTIVE PRODUCERS: JACK L. WARNER and HAL B. WALLIS
PRODUCER: ROBERT LORD
DIRECTOR: ANATOLE LITVAK
DATE: 1939
TYPE: ESPIONAGE, DRAMA
CAST:
EDWARD G. ROBINSON as Edward Renard , FRANCIS LEDERER as Kurt Schneider ,GEORGE SANDERS as Franz Schlager , PAUL LUKAS as Dr. Karl Kassell, HENRY O'NEILL as Attorney Kellogg , DOROTHY TREE as Hilda Keinhauer , LYA LYS as Erika Wolff GRACE STAFFORD as Mrs. Schneider , JAMES STEPHENSON as British Agent, TOMMY BUPP, as shine boy
SOURCE: Internet Movie Database (IMDb.com)
STORY: In a small Scottish town in the late 1930's, Mrs. Mary MacLaughlin operates a secret international Nazi postal office out of her home. Her services are provided to agents all over the world, including Kurt Schneider, an American soldier living in New York. Dr. Karl Kassell, a U.S. Navy Reserve officer, also works for the Nazis, he heads the New York German Bund and is devoted to the "purification" of the German race. Schneider's career as a spy begins with orders to report to the Nazis on the number of American troops stationed in the New York area. He carries this task out successfully, but complains when he is paid a meager monthly wage of fifty dollars. Meanwhile, at a New York Bund rally, Gestapo agents forcibly remove a dissenting voice from the meeting. Subversive Nazi activities are also taking place on board the German Ocean liner Europa, where Franz Schlager is the ship's Nazi leader. He works closely with the ship's beauty salon operator, Hilda Keinhauer, who reports passenger Anna Keller, when she learns Anna does not sympathize with the Nazi regime. Schlager has been instructed to give a new assignment to Schneider when he arrives in New York. Impatient for better work, Schneider sends a letter to Nazi headquarters, but it is intercepted in Scotland and Mrs. MacLaughlin is arrested. The evidence found in MacLaughlin's home prompts an investigation by the F.B.I., led by Edward Renard, into Nazi espionage activities in the United States. Agents are tipped off to one of Schneider's assignments and the Nazi operative is arrested. Schneider is brought to Renard for questioning, and Renard cleverly extracts a full confession from him. When Hilda Keinhauer, whom Schneider implicates, is arrested, she unintentionally implicates Kassell. Renard surprises Kassell at his office, and he, too, eventually cracks and names other members involved in the spy ring. A nationwide dragnet is ordered, and many more agents are captured including Hintze and Wildebrandt, who are later released. Kassell is abducted and taken aboard the S.S. Bismark bound for Germany. Renard sends orders for the ship to stop and surrender Kassell, but the captain refuses. When the ship docks in Germany, the Gestapo orders Kassell to file harassment charges against the F.B.I. Meanwhile, Dr. Krogman, a German government official appears at Regard's office to advise Keinhauer to lie and say that she was forced to sign a false confession. Renard dismisses Krogman from his office, and realizes that the official's attempt to intercede on Keinhauer's behalf proves the German government's complicity in the espionage crimes. The spy case goes before the grand jury, and four of the major participants in the spy ring are convicted and sentenced.
Note: The German government tried to prevent the studio from producing this movie. The film did record-breaking box office business around the world. The film was banned in Japan and eighteen Latin American and European countries. The National Board of Review selected the film as one of the best films of 1939.
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