SITUATION SERIOUS BUT NOT HOPELESS
US, 1965, 97 minutes, Black and white.
Alec Guinness, Robert Redford, Mike Connors, Anita Hoefer.
Directed by Gottfried Reinhardt.
Situation Serious But Not Hopeless is based on a novel by the actor Robert Shaw, The Hiding Place. It focuses on a meek and mild and lonely German air-raid warden who finds two American soldiers in his basement. He keeps them there as his prisoners - benignly, even after the war because he enjoys their company and it makes him feel as if he is important. They experience bewilderment as they eventually escape from his basement and think that they are still in war-torn Germany - when in fact the war is well over.
The film was directed by Gottfried Reinhardt (The Story of Three Loves, Town Without Pity). It is basically a one or two-joke film - but the jokes are elongated into a rather long and repetitive film.
The compensations, however, are Alec Guinness in the central role of Frick the German warden, and Mike Connors and Robert Redford (in a very early role) as the two Americans. There is some humour, some pathos. However, somehow or other, the film does not click as might be expected.
1. Enjoyable comedy on World War Two? On Germans? On Americans? The irony of the title - in comparison with the title of the original novel?
2. Black and white photography, European settings, Germany in the war, after the war? The focus on Frick's house and the cellar? Musical score?
3. The expectations of a war film, the tradition about Americans in the war, the Germans, prisoner-of-war films? The humorous variations?
4. The voice-over and the commentary on the characters, the experience? The portrait of Frick? Alec Guinness's style? His place in the village, his work, not being accepted by the others? His memory of his mother? Finding the men in his cellar, meeting them, getting to know them? Making them feel comfortable, yet his prisoners? Their attempts at escape, his chaining them? His finding food for them, working with them, talking, playing with them? Songs, drinking, dancing? The passing of the time? His growing satisfaction? Explaining the progress of the war and lying to them? Not telling them that the war was over? His own life above ground, in the town, the coming of the Americans, getting supplies? The bar, the dance, talking to the woman, being thrown out, going to hospital? His going back to his house, letting the prisoners out? His watching them? The humour of his not being able to go back home - but his going to America and becoming a waiter?
5. The two Americans, the contrast in their characters and styles, in the basement, their imprisonment, their coping? The sergeant and his reaction, violent, growing the beard, sullen? The fight with Hank? Settling down, playing games? His reaction to Frick? Hank, more urbane, reading, writing, studying? Clashing with the sergeant? Their settling down? The opportunity to escape, their thinking the war was still on, using their techniques of escape, hiding, the guns, seeing the police, the pursuit? Going across the lake and offering amounts of money? Landing up in the film set? Their bewilderment in reading the papers, the death of Roosevelt, the Iron Curtain, etc? Their return home, the joy that the war was over?
6. The sketch of the people in the village, their attitude towards Frick? The Americans and their arrival? The police and their going to Frick's home? The girl who encountered the two Americans after the war, her father's boat, going across the lake? the film-makers?
7. The film's comment on World War Two, human needs, prisoners-of-war - and with the light ironic touch?
