The Captive Heart
Encyclopedia
The Captive Heart is a 1946 British
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...

 war
War film
War films are a film genre concerned with warfare, usually about naval, air or land battles, sometimes focusing instead on prisoners of war, covert operations, military training or other related subjects. At times war films focus on daily military or civilian life in wartime without depicting battles...

 drama
Drama film
A drama film is a film genre that depends mostly on in-depth development of realistic characters dealing with emotional themes. Dramatic themes such as alcoholism, drug addiction, infidelity, moral dilemmas, racial prejudice, religious intolerance, poverty, class divisions, violence against women...

, directed
Film director
A film director is a person who directs the actors and film crew in filmmaking. They control a film's artistic and dramatic nathan roach, while guiding the technical crew and actors.-Responsibilities:...

 by Basil Dearden
Basil Dearden
Basil Dearden was an English film director.-Life and career:Dearden was born at Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex. He graduated from theatre direction to film, working as an assistant to Basil Dean...

 for Ealing Studios
Ealing Studios
Ealing Studios is a television and film production company and facilities provider at Ealing Green in West London. Will Barker bought the White Lodge on Ealing Green in 1902 as a base for film making, and films have been made on the site ever since...

. The film was entered into the 1946 Cannes Film Festival
1946 Cannes Film Festival
The 1st Cannes Film Festival was held from September 20 to October 5, 1946.- Jury :*Georges Huisman *Iris Barry *Beaulieu *Antonin Brousil *J.H.J...

.

Plot

In the summer of 1940, Captain Karel Hasek (Michael Redgrave), a Czech
Czechoslovakia
Czechoslovakia or Czecho-Slovakia was a sovereign state in Central Europe which existed from October 1918, when it declared its independence from the Austro-Hungarian Empire, until 1992...

 soldier, escapes from Dachau concentration camp and assumes the identity of a dead British officer, Captain Geoffrey Mitchell. When he is caught, he joins thousands of British prisoners of war
Prisoner of war
A prisoner of war or enemy prisoner of war is a person, whether civilian or combatant, who is held in custody by an enemy power during or immediately after an armed conflict...

, captured during the Fall of France, on a march to a prison camp.

He is suspected of being a spy by his fellow soldiers because of a few small errors and his fluency in the German language. Captain Grayson (Guy Middleton
Guy Middleton
Guy Middleton Powell, usually credited as Guy Middleton, was an English film character actor.Middleton was born in Hove, England and originally worked in the London Stock Exchange, before turning to acting in the 1930s...

) wants to lynch him forthwith, but Major Dalrymple (Basil Radford
Basil Radford
Basil Radford was an English character actor who featured in many British films of the 1930s and 1940s. He trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art and made his first stage appearance in July 1924...

), the senior British officer, hears Hasek out and believes his story.

To avoid suspicion, he has to maintain the fiction that Mitchell is still alive by corresponding with Mitchell's widow Celia (Rachel Kempson). Prior to the war, Mitchell had abandoned his wife and their two children, but the letters rekindle Celia's love.

After their escape tunnel is discovered, the prisoners resign themselves to a long stay. In 1944, when Herr Forster (Karel Stepanek
Karel Štěpánek
Karel Štěpánek was a Czech actor who spent many years in Austria and generally played German roles onscreen. In 1940 he fled to Britain and spent much of the rest of his career acting there.-Selected filmography:...

), who ran Dachau during Hasek's stay, visits the camp, Hasek fears he may be unmasked. The official compliments him on his nearly perfect German and seems to recognise him, but cannot quite place him. Hasek is sure time is running out; it is announced that some prisoners are to be repatriated
Repatriation
Repatriation is the process of returning a person back to one's place of origin or citizenship. This includes the process of returning refugees or soldiers to their place of origin following a war...

, but when he goes for his medical examination to see if he qualifies, he is turned away. A plan is devised to save him (without his knowledge). Private Mathews (Jimmy Hanley
Jimmy Hanley
Jimmy Hanley was a British actor.Born in Norwich, Norfolk, Hanley began his career as a child actor before becoming popular in juvenile roles...

), a burglar in civilian life, breaks into the Kommandant's office late at night with two other men. They find the list of those to be repatriated and replace Mathews' own name with Mitchell's. On the way back to the barracks, Mathews is attacked by a guard dog and rescued by Hasek. The plan works, and Hasek is "returned" to England.

He goes to see Celia. He breaks the news of her husband's death and that he has grown to love her. She is devastated, and Hasek leaves. After she recovers, she begins rereading his letters and realises that she has come to love the writer. When Hasek calls her on the telephone on the day that Germany surrenders
Victory in Europe Day
Victory in Europe Day commemorates 8 May 1945 , the date when the World War II Allies formally accepted the unconditional surrender of the armed forces of Nazi Germany and the end of Adolf Hitler's Third Reich. The formal surrender of the occupying German forces in the Channel Islands was not...

, she is eager to speak with him.

Cast

  • Michael Redgrave
    Michael Redgrave
    Sir Michael Scudamore Redgrave, CBE was an English stage and film actor, director, manager and author.-Youth and education:...

     as Capt. Karel Hasek, alias Geoffrey Mitchell
  • Rachel Kempson
    Rachel Kempson
    Rachel, Lady Redgrave , known primarily by her birth name as Rachel Kempson, was an English actress. She married Sir Michael Redgrave, and was the matriarch of the famous acting dynasty.-Career:...

     as Celia Mitchell
  • Frederick Leister
    Frederick Leister
    -Filmography:* The Glorious Adventure * The Message * Bracelets * Dreyfus * Down River * The World, the Flesh, the Devil * Evensong * The Iron Duke...

     as Mr. Mowbray
  • Mervyn Johns
    Mervyn Johns
    Mervyn Johns was a Welsh film and television character actor. He was a mainstay of Ealing Studios.Among his dozens of film roles were Walter Craig in Dead of Night , the Church Warden in Went the Day Well? and Bob Cratchit in Scrooge...

     as Pvt. Don Evans
  • Rachel Thomas
    Rachel Thomas
    Rachel Thomas OBE , was a Welsh character actress, well known to film and television audiences.Born in the village of Alltwen, near Pontardawe, Wales, she appeared in such classic films as The Proud Valley with Paul Robeson, Blue Scar and Tiger Bay...

     as Di Evans, Don's wife, who dies giving birth to their child during his absence
  • Jack Warner
    Jack Warner
    Jack Leonard "J. L." Warner , born Jacob Warner in London, Ontario, was a Canadian American film executive who was the president and driving force behind the Warner Bros. Studios in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California...

     as Cpl. Ted Horsfall, Don's friend and business partner in civilian life
  • Gladys Henson
    Gladys Henson
    Gladys Henson was a British actress whose career lasted from 1932 to 1976 and included roles on stage, radio, films and television series...

     as Flo Horsfall, Ted's wife
  • James Harcourt
    James Harcourt
    James Harcourt was a British character actor. He was born on 20 April 1873 in Headingley, Yorkshire.He started work as a cabinet maker, and drifted into amateur dramatics...

     as Doctor
  • Gordon Jackson
    Gordon Jackson (actor)
    Gordon Cameron Jackson, OBE was a Scottish Emmy Award-winning actor best remembered for his roles as the butler Angus Hudson in Upstairs, Downstairs and George Cowley, the head of CI5, in The Professionals....

     as Lt. David Lennox, who breaks off his engagement with Elspeth McDougall when he is blinded in combat
  • Elliott Mason as Mrs. Lennox
  • Margot Fitzsimons as Elspeth McDougall, who refuses to give David up
  • David Keir as Mr. McDougall
  • Derek Bond
    Derek Bond
    Derek William Douglas Bond MC was a British actor.-Life and career:Derek Bond was born 26 January 1920 in Glasgow, Scotland. He attended Haberdashers' Aske's Boys' School in Hampstead, London. He saw active service with the Grenadier Guards in North Africa during the Second World War, for which he...

     as Lt. Stephen Harley, in love with Caroline, but believes a poison pen letter sent to him by Beryl Curtiss
  • Jane Barrett as Caroline Harley
  • Meriel Forbes as Beryl Curtiss, jealous of Caroline because of Robert Marsden's love of her
  • Robert Wyndham as Lt. Cdr. Robert Marsden R.N.V.R.
  • Jimmy Hanley
    Jimmy Hanley
    Jimmy Hanley was a British actor.Born in Norwich, Norfolk, Hanley began his career as a child actor before becoming popular in juvenile roles...

     as Pvt. Mathews
  • Jack Lambert as Padre
  • Karel Stepanek
    Karel Štěpánek
    Karel Štěpánek was a Czech actor who spent many years in Austria and generally played German roles onscreen. In 1940 he fled to Britain and spent much of the rest of his career acting there.-Selected filmography:...

     as Herr Forster
  • Friedrich Richter as Camp Commandant (as Frederick Richter)
  • Frederick Schiller as German Medical Officer
  • Jill Gibbs as Janet Mitchell
  • David Walbridge as Desmond Mitchell


Many of the prisoners were played by serving soldiers.

Production

One of the locations used was the ex-naval prisoner of war camp Marlag, near Westertimke
Westertimke
Westertimke is a municipality in the district of Rotenburg, in Lower Saxony, Germany.Westertimke belonged to the Prince-Archbishopric of Bremen, established in 1180...

, which had remained largely intact after the end of the war the previous year.
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