''Freedom Radio'' (a.k.a. ''A Voice in the Night''
) is a 1941
British
British may refer to:
Peoples, culture, and language
* British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies.
** Britishness, the British identity and common culture
* British English, ...
propaganda film directed by
Anthony Asquith
Anthony William Landon Asquith (; 9 November 1902 – 20 February 1968) was an English film director. He collaborated successfully with playwright Terence Rattigan on ''The Winslow Boy'' (1948) and '' The Browning Version'' (1951), among oth ...
and starring
Clive Brook
Clifford Hardman "Clive" Brook (1 June 1887 – 17 November 1974) was an English film actor.
After making his first screen appearance in 1920, Brook emerged as a leading British actor in the early 1920s. After moving to the United States ...
,
Diana Wynyard
Diana Wynyard, CBE (born Dorothy Isobel Cox; 16 January 1906 – 13 May 1964) was an English stage and film actress.
Life and career
Born in Lewisham, South London, Wynyard began her career on the stage. After performing in Liverpool and Lon ...
,
Raymond Huntley
Horace Raymond Huntley (23 April 1904 – 15 June 1990) was an English actor who appeared in dozens of British films from the 1930s to the 1970s. He also appeared in the ITV period drama '' Upstairs, Downstairs'' as the pragmatic family s ...
and
Derek Farr
Derrick Capel Farr (7 February 191221 March 1986) was an English actor who appeared regularly in British films and television from 1938 until his death in 1986. His more famous roles include Group Captain John Whitworth in '' The Dam Busters' ...
. It is set in
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
during the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
and concerns an underground German
resistance group who run a radio station broadcasting against the totalitarian Third Reich.
It was shot at
Shepperton Studios
Shepperton Studios is a film studio located in Shepperton, Surrey, England, with a history dating back to 1931. It is now part of the Pinewood Studios Group. During its early existence, the studio was branded as Sound City (not to be confused w ...
. The film's sets were designed by the
art director
Art director is the title for a variety of similar job functions in theater, advertising, marketing, publishing, fashion, film industry, film and television, the Internet, and video games.
It is the charge of a sole art director to supervise and ...
Paul Sheriff.
Plot
The story begins in
Vienna
en, Viennese
, iso_code = AT-9
, registration_plate = W
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code =
, timezone = CET
, utc_offset = +1
, timezone_DST ...
just before the beginning of the
Second World War
World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...
. Dr Roder is physician to some important members of the Nazi party but prefers being at his luxurious house with his wife, Irena, and servants. Irena's brother Otto returns from Italy and they throw a party with many interesting and high-ranking attendees. During the party the
Gestapo
The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe.
The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one organi ...
call, requiring his immediate attendance.
At his club, the main servitor, Sebastian, announces the club is closing and they will not see him again.
His wife Irena is an actress, and after her performance it is related that Adolf Hitler very much admired her performance. She is offered a post in
Berlin
Berlin ( , ) is the capital and largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's most populous city, according to population within city limits. One of Germany's sixteen constitue ...
as Reich Director of Popular Pageantry.
At church the priest decries the deposition of a fellow priest, inciting an attack by a group of SS officers including Otto who glares at the shocked doctor. The priest is killed but the press release blames the congregation.
Hans Glaser is trying to get a radio sales licence and the doctor says he will try to help. He tells his fiancee Elly who runs a newspaper stall, despite various papers regularly being confiscated.
Frau Schmidt is pestered by her neighbour who wants to borrow lard. The neighbour eavesdrops and hears her listening to French broadcasts. The neighbour reports her to the SS who smash her radio and arrest her just as the granddaughter Elly arrives. An SS officer assaults the girl. After interrogation she is sent to a "rest home".
Dr Roder and his wife start drifting apart especially when he says the Nazi party is like a cancer. She leaves him and goes to stay in
Stuttgart
Stuttgart (; Swabian: ; ) is the capital and largest city of the German state of Baden-Württemberg. It is located on the Neckar river in a fertile valley known as the ''Stuttgarter Kessel'' (Stuttgart Cauldron) and lies an hour from the ...
. Things get worse, with beatings, interrogations and book burning.
The doctor asks Hans to build a secret radio. Hans first suspects a trick. The doctor explains he wants to create a "Freedom Station"... both knowing they face death if caught. They use a basement under a toy shop and smuggle parts in through toys brought for repair.
He creates a secret radio station transmitting on 26.9, from which he broadcasts condemnations of Hitler and prays for a "better" Germany to arise from the ashes of his ruined country. The unauthorised broadcast is intercepted and a public announcement made saying "do not listen to 26.9" accidentally promoting the station. They broadcast each evening at 10.30pm.
The birth of "Freedom Radio" sees the creation of an underground group of anti-Nazis who regard Karl as their leader.
Multiple people ring the doctor to wish him happy birthday... but it is not his birthday.
Captain Muller explains to his superiors how triangulation can be used to calculate where the signal is coming from. He blames Goebels for jamming the signal which then cannot be traced.
Otto visits Irena when the radio is on, they both think they recognise Dr Roder's voice. Otto is asked to join Muller's detection unit. Fenner starts doing more of the live broadcasts and the doctor's voice is put onto a gramophone record for broadcast.
His friend Rudolf has friends on each side. It is intimated to Rudolph in a coded message that Germany will invade Poland on the following Friday.
It is discovered that Hitler will be making a major broadcast from a stadium and Hans goes to rig up a bypass to allow their own message to be broadcast instead.
Ironically Irena is in charge of organising the pageantry of the huge rally. She has a special seat with Rabenau. Hitler starts to speak then it jumps to Roder... he speaks for under a minute before the power is switched off. Hans escapes dressed as an SS officer.
They suspect Dr Roder and burst into his clinic. They find nothing. Meanwhile Hans gets home and finds Elly in his room.. she looks broken, like an old woman. She has been in a concentration camp.
His wife returns and accuses him of being a traitor. He vows to make one last broadcast. Otto appears and chats with Mrs Roder; he overheard them talking and believes she knows where her husband is going to make the broadcast from. She is taken to Ranenau's office, but tells them the wrong place. However, they work out that Dr Roder had indicated a photo in a frame as the site of the broadcast. The SS identify it as Spiedler's cottage. As Ranenau tells Irena that there will indeed be war she goes to Dr Roder to warn him that the Gestapo are coming to the cottage. But the doctor sets up the transmitter in the back of a van. Irena joins him. The Gestapo close in and locate the van. They fire a machine gun into the van killing the doctor but not before he broadcasts their plan to invade Poland. As he is killed, first Irena takes over the broadcast, then, when she is killed, others in the group broadcast that good people were murdered that day, but that they will continue to broadcast the truth.
Cast
*
Clive Brook
Clifford Hardman "Clive" Brook (1 June 1887 – 17 November 1974) was an English film actor.
After making his first screen appearance in 1920, Brook emerged as a leading British actor in the early 1920s. After moving to the United States ...
as Dr. Karl Roder
*
Diana Wynyard
Diana Wynyard, CBE (born Dorothy Isobel Cox; 16 January 1906 – 13 May 1964) was an English stage and film actress.
Life and career
Born in Lewisham, South London, Wynyard began her career on the stage. After performing in Liverpool and Lon ...
as Irena Roder
*
Raymond Huntley
Horace Raymond Huntley (23 April 1904 – 15 June 1990) was an English actor who appeared in dozens of British films from the 1930s to the 1970s. He also appeared in the ITV period drama '' Upstairs, Downstairs'' as the pragmatic family s ...
as Rabenau
*
Derek Farr
Derrick Capel Farr (7 February 191221 March 1986) was an English actor who appeared regularly in British films and television from 1938 until his death in 1986. His more famous roles include Group Captain John Whitworth in '' The Dam Busters' ...
as Hans Glaser
*
Joyce Howard
Joyce Howard (28 February 1922 in London – 23 November 2010 in Santa Monica, California) was an English actress, writer, and film executive.
After studying at RADA, she was spotted by film director Anthony Asquith in a play at London's Emb ...
as Elly Schmidt
*
Howard Marion-Crawford as Kummer
*
John Penrose
John David Penrose (born 22 June 1964) is a British politician serving as Member of Parliament (MP) for Weston-super-Mare since 2005. A member of the Conservative Party, he was the United Kingdom Anti-Corruption Champion at the Home Office ...
as Otto
*
Morland Graham
Morland Graham (8 August 1891 – 8 April 1949) was a British film actor.
Graham had a career on the stage spanning over 35 years. He was known as a character actor, but also wrote a one act comedy, ''C'est la Guerre'', which was first perf ...
as Father Landbach
*
Ronald Squire
Ronald Launcelot Squire (25 March 1886 – 16 November 1958) was an English character actor.
Biography
Born in Tiverton, Devon, England, the son of an army officer, Lt.-Col. Frederick Squirl and his Irish-born wife Mary (Ronald's surname 'Sq ...
as Rudolf Spiedler
*
Reginald Beckwith as Fenner
*
Clifford Evans as Dressler
*
Bernard Miles
Bernard James Miles, Baron Miles, CBE (27 September 190714 June 1991) was an English character actor, writer and director. He opened the Mermaid Theatre in London in 1959, the first new theatre that opened in the City of London since the 17th ce ...
as Captain Müller S
*
Gibb McLaughlin
George McLoughlin (19 July 1879 – 30 June 1961), known professionally as Gibb McLaughlin, was an English film and stage actor.
Early days
McLaughlin was born in Sunderland, County Durham, England in 1879. For about 10 years he was a sales ...
as Dr Weiner
*
Muriel George
Muriel George (29 August 1883 – 22 October 1965) was an English singer and film actress. She appeared in 55 films between 1932 and 1955. She also appeared on the variety stage and sang on radio with her second husband Ernest Butcher for thir ...
as Hanna
*
Martita Hunt
Martita Edith Hunt (30 January 190013 June 1969) was an Argentine-born British theatre and film actress. She had a dominant stage presence and played a wide range of powerful characters. She is best remembered for her performance as Miss Havi ...
as Frau Lehmann - Concierge
*
Hay Petrie
David Hay Petrie (16 July 1895 – 30 July 1948) was a Scottish actor noted for playing eccentric characters, among them Quilp in ''The Old Curiosity Shop'' (1934), the McLaggen in ''The Ghost Goes West'' (1935) and Uncle Pumblechook in '' Great ...
as Sebastian
*
Manning Whiley
Manning Hedges Whiley (23 January 191529 January 1975) was a British actor.
Partial filmography
* ''Trunk Crime'' (1939) - Bentley
* '' The Four Just Men'' (1939) - (uncredited)
* '' Pack Up Your Troubles'' (1940) - Muller
* '' Contraband'' (19 ...
as SS Trooper
*
Katie Johnson as Granny Schmidt
*
George Hayes as Policeman
*
Everley Gregg
Everley Gregg (26 October 1903, in Bishopstoke, Hampshire – 9 June 1959, in Beaconsfield, Buckinghamshire) was an English actress. Early in her career, she became associated especially with plays of Noël Coward. She began making films in the ...
as Maria Tattenheim
*
Marie Ault
Marie Ault (2 September 1870 – 9 May 1951) was a British character actress of stage and film. Biography
Born as Mary Cragg, in Wigan, Lancashire, (now Greater Manchester. England. Ault was a star in many British films of the silent era but is ...
as Old Woman Customer
*
Abraham Sofaer as Heini
*
Joan Hickson
Joan Bogle Hickson, OBE (5 August 1906 – 17 October 1998) was an English actress of theatre, film and television. She was known for her role as Agatha Christie's Miss Marple in the television series ''Miss Marple''. She also narrated a number ...
as Katie
* Pat McGrath as Kurt
* Wyndham Milligan as SS Guard
* Bunty Payne as Ema
*
William Hartnell
William Henry Hartnell (8 January 1908 – 23 April 1975) was an English actor. He is best remembered for his portrayal of the First Doctor, first incarnation of The Doctor (Doctor Who), the Doctor in ''Doctor Who'' from 1963 to 1966. In film, ...
as Radio Operator
Critical reception
''
The New York Times
''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid ...
'' critic wrote that "this is a frankly propagandistic drama...The admirable emotional restraint which went into the making of several of the better British war films seen here in the past year is sadly lacking."
Sky Movies called the film, "gripping, strongly cast and more subtle than most propaganda thrillers of its time...And film buffs may spot
Katie Johnson, later to win fame in ''
The Ladykillers'' but here, 13 years earlier, already in granny roles!"
Wolfgang Gans zu Putlitz
Wolfgang Gans Edler Herr zu Putlitz (; born 16 July 1899 in Laaske, German Empire, today part of Putlitz, Germany;
died 3 September 1975 in Potsdam, German Democratic Republic) was a German diplomat. He resisted the Nazis and provided informati ...
, German diplomat operating for British intelligence, recalls in his autobiography working on the film as a consultant at Shepperton in the winter of 1939–40.
[''Unterwegs nach Deutschland'', Berlin 1956, p. 284-285 (English translation: ''The Putlitz Dossier'', London 1957).]
External links
*
Freedom Calling! The Story Of The Secret German RadioGerman Peoples Radio - Wikipedia
References
{{Anthony Asquith
1941 films
British World War II propaganda films
Two Cities Films films
Films directed by Anthony Asquith
Films with screenplays by Anatole de Grunwald
Columbia Pictures films
Films shot at Shepperton Studios
Films set in Berlin
British war drama films
1941 war films
1941 drama films
1940s English-language films