Reviews

Well, lots of Hollywood films from 1940 wrestle with the problem of the wars that were then raging in Asia and Europe, and with the likelihood that the US couldn't keep itself out of the madness for very much longer. And this is a pretty blatant example; set just before the Civil War that all the characters "know" to be coming, with every other person making statements about how they're not going to start making moral decisions because they're soldiers who just do their duty. So the film has acquired an interesting historical patina. But the subject matter is just so toe-curlingly awful that there ought to be a health warning before it's shown. Perhaps its best audience would be students of history-with-ethics. And if there's no such college course, perhaps it's best not viewed at all. Plenty of other films to watch, with Errol and Olivia and gunfights (or bowfights)!

The later version is Hollywood English, which I sometimes think is a downtown section of Hollywood Transylvanian. Believe me, the original is the real thing, from the small details up to the social assumptions: it's recognisably English. As such, the thriller is grounded in a reality that the later version can never have. And so it's scary! Of course, I admit that this justification of the original might be a lot less convincing if you're reading my words on the other side of the world...

As for the difficulty of getting hold of a copy, well every few years it's shown on one TV station or another over here, so there has to be a good copy somewhere out there.