Decision Before Dawn
by Anatole Litvak
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DVD details
Actor: Dominique Blanchar, Gary Merrill, Hildegard Knef, Oskar Werner, Richard BasehartDirector: Anatole Litvak
Brand: TWENTIETH CENTURY FOX HOME ENT
DVD: Region Code 1
Audio: English (Original Language); French (Original Language); German (Original Language)
Format: Black & White, NTSC
Picture Format: 1.33:1
Running Time: 119 minutes
DVD Release Date: 2006-05-23
Audience Rating: NR (Not Rated)
Studio: 20th Century Fox
DVD Reviews of Decision Before Dawn
DVD Review: A great war movie - Just okay DVD
Summary: 4 Stars
As someone who appreciates great cinematography and on-location shooting I found this film immediately arresting when TCM broadcast it and resolved to add it to my library. I love Rosellini's Open City & Germany Year Zero, also Staudte's Murderers Are Among Us. There are only a few films that offer us on-location footage from War- and Post-wartime Europe. I took DVD Savant Glenn Erickson by his word when he said the video was of excellent quality. This is not the first time he has mislead his readers. Woman in the Window is another soft transfer he rated as excellent.
The bottom line is: if you are acquiring DVDs to watch them on your DVD player/Analog TV these transfers are beyond reproach. But if you like to watch on a HD laptop, as I do, the transfer is tolerable at best. But that is just not good enough these days. I had come to expect better from Fox. Surely this film deserves a real restoration + commentary.
DVD Review: Might Be best Movie About Intelligence Ever
Summary: 5 Stars
Just saw this movie today on TV (not for the first time) and had to review it despite its age. It has never gotten the attention it deserves I guess because it is too true to life (no sexy blonds or dinner jackets). It is an excellent example of tactical Human Intelligence (HUMINT) as it was actually conducted by the Office of Stategic Services (OSS) tactical detachments during WWII. The assessing, recruitment, training and dispatch of the assets all rings true. One incident that shows the veracity of the movie is when the OSS lieutenant returns to friendly lines and meets up with his fellow OSS members. Some of them see the loss of his best asset on the mission as no big thing because "he was just a traitor" or "just another kraut". This is truly indicative of the outlook of many people on the fringes of HUMINT with no feel for the art of agent handling. read some of the official histories of the OSS and then watch the movie and you'll see how well the subject matter was handled.DVD Review: Solid drama
Summary: 4 Stars
Overall, this is a 4.5 star movie, because of its drama and how it deals with the duplicity of the spy business. However, it has some rough spots. If you are one of those people who doesn't have the patience to stick with a movie for about 10 minutes to see if it evolves into solid entertainment, then you'll be put off.
The first five minutes, and maybe the last five minutes of this film are stilted. Baseheart and his Army sgt. driver get lost and find a couple of escaping German Luftwaffe anti-air artillery soldiers in the French woodland. The way they go about taking them prisoner is just laughable. Sounds like a 1930s gangster flick.
Also, the sgt. driver turns over a Lugar he's taken off the German officer.
This is a special outfit that needs German clothing, razor blades and such, but I don't think the sgt. would just cough up the Lugar. You get a pistol, then you keep it to trade for other more important stuff.
After that, this film settles down to a pretty good "fish out of water" spy flick. Oskar Werner turns in a good performance as the German soldier who volunteers to go back into his own country and spy for the Allies.
Then there's the last two minutes of the film. Wow, it sounds like some kind of training film narration tacked on, and it probably was. It really sounds more like a "Hey Reds we are coming for you too" kind of thing. That's fine when you are scared of commies too, I guess, but it kind of sounds silly in the 21st Century.
I won't give away too much, but this film is worth the 95 minutes or so you take to watch it.
DVD Review: Army Training manual
Summary: 4 Stars
The acting, dialog, and plot of this movie are stilted and crude. The characters are more like types from an Army training manual than real people. The moral lessons are at pre-K level. But this movie is filmed in Europe in the years immediately following WWII, with real uniforms, real settings, real war equipment, and historically accurate events. Taken by itself, this is a 2 star movie at best. With its superlative realism, the movie is a 4 star movie, a must-see for any student of history and any fan of war movies.DVD Review: Glad I watched it . . . once
Summary: 2 Stars
Not bad, with a rather original, realistic and mature story line. That being said, I thought the movie didn't rise to the story behind it. Mediocre acting, etc. Rather unsure about this movie. The two-star rating was a flip of the coin.
Description of Decision Before Dawn
Studio: Tcfhe Release Date: 05/13/2008 Rating: NrRooting for a German soldier was a daring choice for a movie made in 1951, but Decision Before Dawn justifies the risk; this is a crackling good war movie. In late 1944, the Allies are pushing through Europe but need intelligence behind German lines. Two Americans (Richard Basehart, Gary Merrill) recruit German POWs and enlist them to spy on their former Fatherland. We follow the adventures of one such agent, arrestingly played by the young Oskar Werner, who parachutes into Bavaria and gathers information. (Oddly, the film abandons Basehart and another recruit, marvelously played by Hans Christian Blech, who have also gone under cover.) The well-deployed suspense is accompanied by a constant examination of what it means to be German, and what loyalty to one's country really entails--dutiful devotion or skeptical rebellion? This question doesn't go deep (there's a sense that the movie is a make-nice effort toward a new economic ally), but the film is on solid ground whenever the clockwork suspense takes over. Hildegarde Knef (here billed under her Hollywood spelling, Neff) turns up as a conflicted fraulein. Director Anatole Litvak, shooting on location, gets some amazing shots of bombed-out buildings and ruined towns; in that sense, the film is almost like a documentary record of the postwar landscape. Decision Before Dawn was nominated for the best picture Oscar, but became a lesser-known film in the decades that followed. It deserves a higher profile. --Robert Horton
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