Passage to Marseille (1944)

I'll tell you why so serious

Great Film overall

Although it has its amusing moments, in eneral the plot does not convince.

By the time the dramatic fireworks start popping off, each one feels earned.

This isn't a very good movie, but James Wong Howe's brilliant cinematography makes it look like one. This is the sort of movie worth watching just to see how spectacular Howe was.Outside of that, it's a little dull. The flashback within a flashback within an etc. doesn't work that well, mainly because the movie fails to make any of its threads or characters all that interesting. Designed as war propaganda, the movie is often ostentatiously obvious, most notably in the rah-rah score and in things like the little French boy screaming Viva le France! Much of this was probably very stirring at the time, but it doesn't age well.The film also has a lot of typical Hollywood nonsense, like the way a movie in which everyone is French has major characters speak English while minor characters speak French and accents are whatever the actors walked in with. It's not that unusual for the time but I found it distracting. It might have been better if everyone spoke French, since the dialogue is often wretched (although, as with the characters, it is stylistically inconsistent, shifting from straightforward conversation to ornate, flower speeches).I do like this movie better than the first time I saw it when I was in college (in the 1980s), though I still don't like it much. But my god, what cinematography!

"Passage to Marseille" is a Warner Brothers film starring the usual Warner Brothers stellar cast: Humphrey Bogart, Peter Lorre, Sydney Greenstreet, and Claude Rains, and also featuring Michele Morgan, George Tobias, Helmut Dantine, Philip Dorn, and John Loder. Though no one seems to like the comparison with "Casablanca," it does seem to be trying to cash in on that film's huge success when one considers the cast and Bogie's conflicted character. But "Passage to Marseille" is a good film on its own, despite the obvious comparisons.The story is told in flashback, and also in a flashback within a flashback. The film begins in a secret base in France that's disguised as a farm, and one of the characters asks Captain Freycinet (Rains) about a pilot (Bogart). Turns out that Bogart, Lorre, Tobias, Dantine, and several other men are Devil's Island escapees who were picked up by a ship, Ville de Nancy, which is on its way to Marseille. The sympathetic captain hears their individual stories. All want to fight for France.Matrac (Bogart) was a journalist opposed to the Munich Pact, and the newspaper he worked for was leveled to the ground. The focus is mainly on his character; he has left a wife (Michele Morgan) and a little boy he's never seen.Some very exciting scenes in this entertaining and often poignant film, sturdily directed by Michael Curtiz, with excellent performances. Definitely worth seeing, even if it's not the best of the WW II genre.

Michael Curtiz made this movie as a propaganda movie. Bogart is playing well, but the weak script does not give him the ability for a good performance. The scene on the boat where he is shooting at the German pilots and navigators is a shame: shoot at people without defense! At war, it happened, so it is realistic that it is in the film. It is also true that some crew members were loyal to the London government (which had to be build up) and that they refused to give their ships to the Vichy government. The dispute between the commanders (army, navy an air) is realistic and well done. The shooting of the plane is a remarkable battle scene. The end with the Handley-Page planes coming back is moving.

This is one of the better American propaganda films made during WWII--as it not only did an excellent job of entertaining and encouraging the folks at home, but it was also well made--with some wonderful performances. I am not just saying that because I am a huge Humphrey Bogart fan--after all, despite his having top billing, it is really an ensemble film. No, Warner Brothers did a bang-up job of getting excellent character actors, combining them with excellent direction as well as an excellent story. About the only serious negative about the film was the structure of the film itself (not the plot). The film begins with two men talking and the movie is told through flashbacks. This is a common theme in older films and I don't mind it at all,...within limits. But, when the flashback begins to have a flashback and this other flashback diverges into yet another flashback, it just looks like sloppy writing--and this is a real shame as the dialog and plot are very good. So my advice is to still watch the film and try to look past this odd style. If you do, you will be rewarded with an excellent film filled with excellent acting, dialog and a rousing and not too unbelievable series of adventures.By the way, for historians and airplane lovers out there, the film is really a mixed bag. In the beginning of the film, Bogart's bomber changes from what appears to be a B-17 A, B, C or D to a B-17 E or F in mid-flight. While in some planes the differences between versions of a model are usually pretty insignificant, in the B-17 it was such a radical redesign, it really does look like two totally different planes. So in this case, they did a lousy job of paying attention to details. However, late in the film when the ship is attacked by a German patrol plane, the attacking plane really does look like a real FW-200--the standard German plane for such anti-shipping details. This type of plane is rarely, if ever, shown in movies and I liked how someone at Warner Brothers really cared to try to get it right.