{"id":6557,"date":"2011-09-22T18:49:23","date_gmt":"2011-09-22T22:49:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/?p=6557"},"modified":"2015-10-20T08:08:14","modified_gmt":"2015-10-20T13:08:14","slug":"contraband-1940-michael-powell","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/archives\/6557","title":{"rendered":"Contraband (1940, Michael Powell)"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’ve seen a lot of wartime films by the Powell\/Pressburger crew, but this one was the most fun.<\/p>\n

Neutral ship captain Conrad Veidt (Casablanca<\/a><\/em> and Thief of Bagdad<\/a><\/em> baddie) and his passengers and crew are stuck at a British port having their ship searched for contraband, when a tough-talkin’ broad (Valerie Hobson of Bride of Frankenstein<\/em>, Kind Hearts and Coronets<\/em>) slips away. Conrad secretly follows her to shore, finds out she’s a spy, gets involved in hijinks, and foils some sort of nazi plot.<\/p>\n

They’re all gonna laugh at you, Conrad:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

To attract police attention to the baddies’ lair, Conrad turns on all the lights during the war blackout:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

It was easy to follow at the time, but a month later the details are hazy. I remember the girl’s co-conspirator was Mr. Pigeon (Esmond Knight, the old guy who tosses an arrow into the king at the start of Robin and Marian<\/a><\/em>), that the baddy is Van Dyne (Raymond Lovell, later in 49th Parallel<\/a><\/em>). They recruit an excitable Danish chef, the brother of an officer on Conrad’s ship (played by the same actor since they share no scenes), who almost steals the film.<\/p>\n

The credits boldly name this scene the “White Negro” Cabaret:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

A. Ives for Senses:<\/p>\n

Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger … would later get into considerable trouble with Churchill on The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp<\/a><\/em>, when they suggested that not all Germans were bad, and that traditional British codes of honour were meaningless in fighting such a ruthless enemy as the Nazis. Britain had to fight dirty, they essentially argued. These theories are also propagated by Contraband<\/em>, if in a somewhat undercooked fashion. So Veidt fights dirty as he tracks down the Nazis – beating up some British officers in his quest – while the meta-cinema of Contraband<\/em> (mentioned above) clearly shows an affection for a lost Germany [references Fritz Lang, stars Conrad from Cabinet of Dr. Caligari<\/em>].<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Inside the nazi lair:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

Our friendly spies are surely doomed:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

But wait! Conrad’s in the elevator with a gun:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n

Shootout ensues in a bust warehouse:<\/em>
\n<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve seen a lot of wartime films by the Powell\/Pressburger crew, but this one was the most fun. Neutral ship captain Conrad Veidt (Casablanca and Thief of Bagdad baddie) and his passengers and crew are stuck at a British port having their ship searched for contraband, when a tough-talkin’ broad (Valerie Hobson of Bride of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[416,102,1352,331,81,248,1353,472],"class_list":["post-6557","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-movie","tag-1940s","tag-britain","tag-conrad-veidt","tag-emeric-pressburger","tag-michael-powell","tag-nazis","tag-valerie-hobson","tag-wwii"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6557","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6557"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6557\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10498,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6557\/revisions\/10498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6557"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6557"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/deeperintomovies.net\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6557"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}