THE CAPTIVE HEART is a film that turns its viewers into a captive audience. Along with CARVE HER NAME WITH PRIDE, I consider it one of the finest British war films to depict the harrowing nature of life inside a Nazi concentration camp. The story merely starts in such a place, because as incredible events unfold, it only gets more harrowing...more dangerous for the main character.
Michael Redgrave is a Czech captain who escapes from Dachau and assumes the identity of a dead British officer. However, while he's managed to avoid death, he is still not very lucky. Under his new guise, he is captured along with British soldiers and taken to a new camp for prisoners of war.
The producers shot these particular scenes on location at Marlag, a POW site in Germany. Filming occurred only a short time after the war had ended...when such structures were still intact...so considerable realism is added to the story.
Redgrave gives a sharp performance. He skillfully navigates the trickier aspects of the plot. After all, he's a British actor playing a Czech posing as a Brit-- and he has to speak convincing German at key moments. In addition to the different national identities and dialects required for the role, he has to maneuver a character who is heroic and deceptive at the same time...someone that does whatever is necessary to survive.
Part of surviving involves writing love letters to the estranged wife (Rachel Kempson) of the man he's impersonating. It's a hoax of romantic proportions, and he unwittingly wins the wife back through this correspondence. Naturally, she does not yet know her husband is dead or that a foreign Cyrano is behind the messages she keeps receiving by mail. Instead she continues to read and savor each word.
Screenwriters Angus MacPhail and Guy Morgan have adapted a story by Patrick Kirwan that's based on the true story of two people. Mr. Redgrave's character is standing in for a Czech officer named Josef Bryks, who had joined the RAF Reserve and did end up having a relationship with the widow of a pilot who served in the RAF. The couple married after the war; however, this film's narrative stops short of wedded bliss.
Redgrave is busted out of the POW camp, and he makes his way to England. This sets the stage for the denouement where he finally meets the lady he's been playing post office with all this time. He confesses the ruse and lets her know why he had to take her late husband's identity. She seems to understand, though she is emotionally conflicted by the news. After learning about her husband's death, she rereads the letters she had received during the war from this imposter. She decides he is the man she now loves!
Off camera, Rachel Kempson and Michael Redgrave had an even more unusual relationship. They though they would remain married, Redgrave struggled with his sexuality and was often unfaithful-- something Kempson seemed to tolerate. A short time after THE CAPTIVE HEART hit screens, they took their children to America and made films in Hollywood for awhile. But none of those pictures were half as good as THE CAPTIVE HEART.
Michael Redgrave is a Czech captain who escapes from Dachau and assumes the identity of a dead British officer. However, while he's managed to avoid death, he is still not very lucky. Under his new guise, he is captured along with British soldiers and taken to a new camp for prisoners of war.
The producers shot these particular scenes on location at Marlag, a POW site in Germany. Filming occurred only a short time after the war had ended...when such structures were still intact...so considerable realism is added to the story.
Redgrave gives a sharp performance. He skillfully navigates the trickier aspects of the plot. After all, he's a British actor playing a Czech posing as a Brit-- and he has to speak convincing German at key moments. In addition to the different national identities and dialects required for the role, he has to maneuver a character who is heroic and deceptive at the same time...someone that does whatever is necessary to survive.
Part of surviving involves writing love letters to the estranged wife (Rachel Kempson) of the man he's impersonating. It's a hoax of romantic proportions, and he unwittingly wins the wife back through this correspondence. Naturally, she does not yet know her husband is dead or that a foreign Cyrano is behind the messages she keeps receiving by mail. Instead she continues to read and savor each word.
Screenwriters Angus MacPhail and Guy Morgan have adapted a story by Patrick Kirwan that's based on the true story of two people. Mr. Redgrave's character is standing in for a Czech officer named Josef Bryks, who had joined the RAF Reserve and did end up having a relationship with the widow of a pilot who served in the RAF. The couple married after the war; however, this film's narrative stops short of wedded bliss.
Redgrave is busted out of the POW camp, and he makes his way to England. This sets the stage for the denouement where he finally meets the lady he's been playing post office with all this time. He confesses the ruse and lets her know why he had to take her late husband's identity. She seems to understand, though she is emotionally conflicted by the news. After learning about her husband's death, she rereads the letters she had received during the war from this imposter. She decides he is the man she now loves!
Off camera, Rachel Kempson and Michael Redgrave had an even more unusual relationship. They though they would remain married, Redgrave struggled with his sexuality and was often unfaithful-- something Kempson seemed to tolerate. A short time after THE CAPTIVE HEART hit screens, they took their children to America and made films in Hollywood for awhile. But none of those pictures were half as good as THE CAPTIVE HEART.