Hans Schumm | Through the Shattered Lens

In the 1942 film, Berlin Correspondent, Dana Andrews plays Bill Roberts.

Bill is an American journalist, working out of Berlin. Because the film takes place before America’s entry into World War II, Bill pretends to report only what the Germans want him to report. Even while there are bombs exploding outside of the studio, Bill and his fellow correspondents report that everyone in Berlin is happy and that the German government is doing a great job.

However, Bill fills his reporting with code words, which are then interpreted by listeners in the American Intelligence service. They understand that when Bill says that the people are happy, that means that they’re actually miserable. When Bill says that the weather in Berlin is cloudy, that means that there is dissent brewing in the government.

Still, Captain Von Rau (Martin Kosleck) comes to suspect that Bill might be sending out secret messages and he decides to send someone to not only compromise Bill but to also discover who is feeding Bill information. Von Rau sends his own fiancée, Karen Hauen (Virginia Gilmore), to seduce Bill. Little does Von Rau suspect that Bill’s source of information is Karen’s own father (Erwin Kalser) and that Karen herself is going to end up falling in love with Bill.

Berlin Correspondent is typical of the films that were made to try to build support for the American war effort during the Second World War. The hero is a tough and cynical American who pretends to not care about what is happening in the rest of the world but who eventually reveals himself to be an idealist with a strong sense of right and wrong. Bill may say that he’s only in Berlin to report the news but, when Karen’s father is sent to a concentration camp, Bill proves himself to be willing to risk his own life to help the older man make it to Switzerland. Karen’s father stands in for the members of the German resistance who worked from the inside to bring down the Nazis. Bill and Karen’s love serves as a reminder that the world can come back together but only after Hitler has been defeated.

The two main Nazi villains are played by Martin Kosleck and Sig Ruman, two German actors who immigrated to the United States to escape the real-life Nazis. Kosleck and Ruman play their characters as being buffoonish bullies who are easily outsmarted by street smart Americans like Bill. It’s the film’s way of saying to the audience, “Are you really going to let these idiots think that they can defeat America?” Still, a scene is included in which a crippled girl is described as being someone who should be put to death. It’s a necessary reminder that the Nazis may be idiots but they’re also a legitimate threat.

Berlin Correspondent clocks in at a brisk 70 minutes and it features a typically strong leading performance from Dana Andrews. If you needed someone to fight for America, 40s-era Dana Andrews would definitely be a good pick to go with. It’s a joy to watch him outsmart the Nazis.

1941’s Underground tells the story of two brothers on opposite sides in Nazi Germany.

Kurt Franken (Jeffrey Lynn) is a patriotic German who believes that the country got a raw deal at the end of World War I and who is a strong supporter of the Nazis. He served in the army, fighting on the front. When he returns home to Berlin, he’s missing an arm. Whenever his friends and his family say that they’re sorry that he lost his arm, he replies that he was happy to make the sacrifice for his country. When someone starts to mourn for his son who was killed in the fighting, Kurt accuses the man of being a traitor for doubting the wisdom of the government. Kurt is a true believer, just the type to be recruited by the SS and tasked with helping to investigate who is behind a series of anti-Nazi radio broadcasts. Kurt believes that, if the government says it, it must be right. Laws must be obeyed and orders followed without question. Kurt, in other words, is a very familiar type.

What Kurt doesn’t realize is that the man behind the broadcasts is his own brother, Eric (Phillip Dorn). As Kurt investigates, he falls in love with Sylvia (Kaaren Verne) without realizing that she is also a part of the resistance. While Kurt tries to discover who is behind the underground radio station, Eric and his fellow resistance members attempt to stay one step ahead of the Gestapo.

For a film made in 1941, the film’s doesn’t flinch from showing the brutality of the Gestapo. Like all authoritarian dictatorships, The Third Reich is determined to quash any and all signs of dissent and they investigate the underground radio station with a ruthlessness that even takes Kurt by surprise. Witnessing first hand the brutality and sadism of the government for which he gave his arm, Kurt starts to doubt his previous beliefs. But will Kurt’s doubts come in time to save the lives of Eric and his fellow resistance members?

Made at a time when the United States was still officially neutral in the violent conflict that was sweeping the rest of the world and released just a few months before the U.S. officially declared war on the Axis Powers, Underground is a powerful look at life under a dictatorship. Shot in a noir style, the film’s black-and-white imagery perfectly captures the harshness of life in Germany while the shadows in the background perfectly capture the paranoia of knowing that saying the wrong word could lead to arrest, torture, and death. The film’s final minutes involve a guillotine sitting ominously in the background, a reminder that Nazi Germany was not the first authoritarian regime and that it would not be the last.

The film is well-acted, with Jeffrey Lynn epitomizing the otherwise intelligent people who allow themselves to get caught up in the madness of the majority. His discovery of the truth about Germany was obviously meant to mirror the awakening of the Americans who previously supported a policy of neutrality. By the end of the film, both Karl Franken and the audience understand that the time for neutrality has passed.