Night Train to Munich (1940)

Best movie ever!

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

It’s not bad or unwatchable but despite the amplitude of the spectacle, the end result is underwhelming.

The movie really just wants to entertain people.

When Germany invades Czechoslovakia, the German and the British intelligence services try to capture Czech scientist Axel Bomasch (James Harcourt), inventor of a new type of armor-plating.The film has been compared to "The Lady Vanishes", with academic Michael Wood describing it as an "ironic remake"; the publicity at the time of release erroneously claimed it is a sequel. It has a similar situation in a war torn continental Europe, and both have scripts by Launder and Gilliat. The two slightly eccentric and cricket-mad English travelers, Charters and Caldicott, are carried over. The films are otherwise similar in setting, and both feature similar lead character types: the clever young woman in distress and eccentric upper-class Englishman.The question to ask is, who handles the material better: Hitchcock or Reed? While it is hard to say anyone could outdo Hitchcock, I think Reed really was the better director, at least in the 1940s. I suppose later Hitchcock became the most outstanding, but I daresay "The Third Man" is worlds better than anything Hitchcock was doing.

Carol Reed displays his ability to combine the elements of a superb thriller with the droll comedy of the English drawing room in this espionage suspense film set during WWII.Rex Harrison shines as a Brit disguising himself as a Nazi officer so he can infiltrate German headquarters and make off with a scientist and his daughter being held captive. The film culminates in a nail-biting finale set on the German/Swiss border.Bland Margaret Lockwood plays the heroine, but it doesn't much matter that she's pretty much a drip, because Harrison is the one you want to watch anyway. Paul Henreid equips himself well as an evil German.Aside from Harrison, the highlight of the film are the incidental characters played by Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne, who play two uninvolved British civilians who are persuaded to help Harrison's team outwit the Nazis and who react exactly the same to Nazis shooting at them as they do Nazis stealing their seats on the train. These two actors were paired up and used in a very similar way in Alfred Hitchcock's film from a few years prior, "The Lady Vanishes." Though its year of release here is listed as 1940, "Night Train to Munich" was nominated for a 1941 Academy Award in the category of Best Original Story (Gordon Wellesley), an award it lost to Harry Segall for "Here Comes Mr. Jordan." Grade: A

Very good Rex Harrison and Margaret Lockwood vehicle at the dawn of World War 11. As Nazi Germany goes on the march against Austria, The Sudetenland and the rest of Czechoslovakia, a woman and her father prepare to flee the Czech country only for her to be imprisoned. The father, a scientist, is desired by the Nazis to work for them.While the father escapes, the daughter is trapped and imprisoned. There she meets Paul Henried, who comes to her aid to get her to England. What she doesn't know is that Henried is a Nazi official himself who wants Lockwood to lead him directly to her father.When this does happen, Lockwood, in England, had met secret agent Rex Harrison. Harrison goes to Germany disguised as a German army official trying to get Lockwood and her father out.The film is a good one as there are constant twists along the way. Naturally, Harrison is recognized by 2 British men in Germany, but luckily he was as they are later able to warn him that the Germans know what he is up to.The ending is an exciting chase scene as the trio flee to Switzerland via a ski lift with Henried and his men in hot pursuit.Surprisingly, the film has little violence.

"Night Train to Munich" (1940) is a smaller and lighter Carol Reed film, a little uncharacteristic, but nevertheless very good. The stars are Margaret Lockwood, Rex Harrison, Paul von Henreid, Basil Radford and Naunton Wayne. A Czech scientist is taken to England for safety so the Nazis won't get him or his work when the Czechs invade, but his daughter Anna (Lockwood) is captured and sent to a concentration camp. While there, she meets Karl Marsen (Paul Henreid as Paul von Henreid) who recognizes one of the Nazi officers at the camp as someone he knew, and the man helps both of them to escape. Once in England, she contacts her father through a performer, Gus Bennett (Harrison), in reality a government agent. Unfortunately, she and her father again fall into enemy hands, and Randell disguises himself as a Nazi officer in order to return to them England.Very suspenseful with great chemistry between the two stars. What helps make this film, though, are Radford and Wayne of "The Lady Vanishes" fame, who are hilarious as two airhead train passengers, one of whom recognizes Harrison as British, though he's in Nazi regalia. The two were an extremely popular pair and appeared together in several films.Very good.