''Five Graves to Cairo'' is a 1943
war film
War film is a film genre concerned with warfare, typically about navy, naval, air force, air, or army, land battles, with combat scenes central to the drama. It has been strongly associated with the 20th century. The fateful nature of battle s ...
directed by
Billy Wilder
Billy Wilder (; ; born Samuel Wilder; June 22, 1906 – March 27, 2002) was an Austrian-American filmmaker. His career in Hollywood spanned five decades, and he is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Classic Hol ...
and starring
Franchot Tone
Stanislaus Pascal Franchot Tone (February 27, 1905 – September 18, 1968) was an American actor, producer, and director of stage, film and television. He was a leading man in the 1930s and early 1940s, and at the height of his career was known ...
and
Anne Baxter. Set in
World War II
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 opposing ...
, it is one of a number of films based on
Lajos Bíró's 1917 play ''Hotel Imperial: Színmű négy felvonásban'', including the 1927 film ''
Hotel Imperial
The Hotel Imperial, also known as The Imperial, is a five-star luxury hotel in Vienna, Austria. It is located on the Vienna Ring Road (''Ringstraße'') at Kärntner Ring 16, in the Innere Stadt district.
Description
The Hotel Imperial's faça ...
''.
Erich von Stroheim portrays
Field Marshal Erwin Rommel in a supporting performance.
Hans Dreier,
Ernst Fegté and
Bertram C. Granger were nominated for the
Academy Award for Best Art Direction
The Academy Award for Best Production Design recognizes achievement for art direction in film. The category's original name was Best Art Direction, but was changed to its current name in 2012 for the 85th Academy Awards. This change resulted fro ...
,
John F. Seitz for
Best Cinematography, and
Doane Harrison for
Best Film Editing.
Plot
Corporal John Bramble is the sole survivor of a British tank crew after
Erwin Rommel and his
Afrika Korps
The Afrika Korps or German Africa Corps (, }; DAK) was the German expeditionary force in Africa during the North African Campaign of World War II. First sent as a holding force to shore up the Italian defense of its African colonies, the ...
capture Tobruk in June 1942 and pursue the British into
Egypt
Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Medit ...
. He stumbles across the North African desert into the town of Sidi Halfaya, where he finds the Empress of Britain, a small, isolated hotel owned by Farid. The only other employee is the French chambermaid Mouche, as the cook fled with the British and the waiter Davos was killed the night before by German bombing.
Farid hides the now-unconscious Bramble when the swiftly advancing Germans take over the hotel to use as headquarters for Field Marshal Rommel and his staff. Bramble assumes the identity of Davos to save himself. When Rommel summons him to a private chat, Bramble is stunned to discover that Davos was a valued German spy, but manages to play along. He learns that he is to be sent to
Cairo
Cairo ( ; ar, القاهرة, al-Qāhirah, ) is the Capital city, capital of Egypt and its largest city, home to 10 million people. It is also part of the List of urban agglomerations in Africa, largest urban agglomeration in Africa, List of ...
next.
Later, he steals a pistol from genial, music-loving
Italian
Italian(s) may refer to:
* Anything of, from, or related to the people of Italy over the centuries
** Italians, an ethnic group or simply a citizen of the Italian Republic or Italian Kingdom
** Italian language, a Romance language
*** Regional Ita ...
General Sebastiano, planning to serve the field marshal a bullet rather than coffee the next morning. Not wanting trouble, Mouche steals the pistol and waits on Rommel herself. When some captured British officers are brought to the hotel for a luncheon with Rommel, one of them (a past guest) realizes that Davos has been replaced. Bramble privately explains who he is and what he plans to do. The officer orders him to use his position of trust to gather military intelligence instead.
At the luncheon, Rommel teases his guests, allowing them to ask him
twenty questions about his future plans. Bramble listens with interest. From the conversation and later remarks by Rommel, he eventually deduces that the field marshal, disguised as an archeologist before the war, had secretly prepared five hidden supply dumps, the "Five Graves to Cairo", for the conquest of Egypt. The final piece of the puzzle (their locations) falls into place when Bramble realizes that Rommel's cryptic references to points Y, P, and T refer to the precise locations of the letters of the word "Egypt" printed on his map.
Meanwhile, Bramble and Mouche clash. She despises the British, believing they abandoned the French, including her two brothers, at
Dunkirk. He in turn becomes disgusted at how she plays up to the Germans. As it turns out, Mouche's motives are not mercenary; she pleads with Rommel to release her wounded soldier brother from a
concentration camp
Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simpl ...
. He is unmoved, but his aide, Lieutenant Schwegler, is more appreciative of her charms. He pretends to help her, showing her fake telegrams to and from Germany.
That night however, when everyone takes shelter in the cellar during an Allied air raid, Schwegler discovers the body of the real Davos (identified by his
clubfoot), uncovered by the bombing. In the noise and confusion of the raid, Schwegler chases Bramble through the darkened hotel, before Bramble kills the German and hides the body in Mouche's part of the servants' room. When Mouche finds out, she threatens to unmask him. However, she has a change of heart. Schwegler's body is soon found, and Rommel accuses her of killing his aide when she discovered he was lying about trying to get her brother released. To protect Bramble, Mouche confirms this. Bramble leaves for Cairo, but arranges for Farid to present evidence the next day at Mouche's trial that "Davos" committed the crime.
Bramble's information allows the British to blow up the dumps and thus thwart Rommel's plans, culminating in the
Second Battle of El Alamein
The Second Battle of El Alamein (23 October – 11 November 1942) was a battle of the Second World War that took place near the Egyptian railway halt of El Alamein. The First Battle of El Alamein and the Battle of Alam el Halfa had prevented th ...
. When Bramble returns to Sidi Halfaya in triumph with his unit, he learns the Germans executed Mouche, even though she was exonerated of Schwegler's murder, because she would not stop saying that the British would be back. Bramble takes the parasol he bought her in Cairo, something she always wanted, and places it to provide shade for her grave.
Cast
*
Franchot Tone
Stanislaus Pascal Franchot Tone (February 27, 1905 – September 18, 1968) was an American actor, producer, and director of stage, film and television. He was a leading man in the 1930s and early 1940s, and at the height of his career was known ...
as Corporal John Bramble / Davos
*
Anne Baxter as ''Mouche''
*
Akim Tamiroff as ''Farid''
*
Erich von Stroheim as
Field Marshal Erwin Rommel
*
Peter van Eyck as ''Lieutenant Schwegler''
*
Fortunio Bonanova
Fortunio Bonanova, pseudonym of Josep Lluís Moll, (13 January 1895 – 2 April 1969) was a Spanish baritone singer and a film, theater, and television actor. He occasionally worked as a producer and director.
According to Lluis Fàbregas Cuixar ...
as ''General Sebastiano''
Production
Production lasted from January 4 to February 20, 1943. It was filmed at Paramount Studios,
Hollywood, California
Hollywood is a neighborhood in the central region of Los Angeles, California. Its name has come to be a shorthand reference for the U.S. film industry and the people associated with it. Many notable film studios, such as Columbia Pictures, ...
, with some exteriors of Sidi Halfaya (a fictionalized version of
Sidi Barrani
Sidi Barrani ( ar, سيدي براني ) is a town in Egypt, near the Mediterranean Sea, about
east of the Egypt–Libya border, and around from Tobruk, Libya.
Named after Sidi es-Saadi el Barrani, a Senussi sheikh who was a head of ...
) shot on location at the
Salton Sea and other exteriors filmed at Camp Young at the Army
Desert Training Center
The Desert Training Center (DTC), also known as California–Arizona Maneuver Area (CAMA), was a World War II training facility established in the Mojave Desert and Sonoran Desert, largely in Southern California and Western Arizona in 1942.
It ...
,
Indio, California, where, with the cooperation of the Army Ground Forces, a battle sequence was staged, and in
Yuma, Arizona.
Wilder wanted
Cary Grant
Cary Grant (born Archibald Alec Leach; January 18, 1904November 29, 1986) was an English-American actor. He was known for his Mid-Atlantic accent, debonair demeanor, light-hearted approach to acting, and sense of comic timing. He was one o ...
to play the role of Bramble. Grant was repeatedly asked by Wilder to star in several of his films, but though the two were friends, Grant consistently refused.
A ''Hollywood Reporter'' news item reported that in November 1942,
David O. Selznick had agreed to lend
Ingrid Bergman for this film. However, Paramount instead borrowed Anne Baxter from
Twentieth Century-Fox.
The Germans are played by German actors and thus speak with the right accent, except for von Stroheim, who had emigrated from Austria to the US at the age of 24 and whose accent occasionally slips. The British hero is played by an American actor who speaks with an American accent.
The German tanks in the film are American
M2 light tanks, which were used for training, while the British forces have the American
M3 Medium tank which they were using at the time.
Reception
Bosley Crowther
Francis Bosley Crowther Jr. (July 13, 1905 – March 7, 1981) was an American journalist, writer, and film critic for ''The New York Times'' for 27 years. His work helped shape the careers of many actors, directors and screenwriters, though his ...
of ''
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 d ...
'' gave the film a mixed review. He admired one performance, writing, "... von Stroheim has all other movie Huns backed completely off the screen" and " ... whenever he appears in this picture, ... , he gives you the creeps and the shivers. Boy, what a nasty Hun!"
However, he was less than impressed with the rest, complaining, "As though this fanciful story weren't sufficiently hard to take, Charles Brackett and Billy Wilder, a couple of old-hand Paramount wags, have dressed it up with shenanigans which have the flavor of fun in a haunted house."
[ "It has a little something for all tastes, provided you don't give a darn."][ The '']Variety
Variety may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Entertainment formats
* Variety (radio)
* Variety show, in theater and television
Films
* ''Variety'' (1925 film), a German silent film directed by Ewald Andre Dupont
* ''Variety'' (1935 film), ...
'' magazine response was more generous, calling it "a dynamic, moving vehicle" and praising Wilder's handling of "the varied story elements, countless suspenseful moments and vivid portrayals in excellent fashion." Dave Kehr of the '' Chicago Reader'' agreed, characterizing the film as a "crisp spy thriller" and, as Wilder's second stint at directing, "Excellent apprentice work, with many Wilder themes seething beneath the surface."
In 2008, Quentin Tarantino listed ''Five Graves to Cairo'' as his 10th favorite film of all time.
Real-life connection
Brigadier Dudley Clarke, the commander of the British deception department based in Cairo, saw ''Five Graves to Cairo'' in January 1944 and was inspired to create Operation Copperhead. General Bernard Montgomery had recently been transferred from North Africa to England to take command of the ground forces intended for the Normandy invasion. Clarke located a look-alike, pre-war actor Lieutenant M. E. Clifton James, and had him study Montgomery's appearance and mannerisms. The actor then made public visits to several Mediterranean bases in the guise of Montgomery just a few days before D-Day in an attempt to convince German intelligence that an Allied attack on northern Europe was not imminent. Though the ruse did not appear to have any significant impact on German plans, the events of Operation Copperhead were in turn dramatized in a book and a movie, both titled '' I Was Monty's Double''.
Home media
The film is available on VHS, DVD
The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kind ...
and Blu-ray
The Blu-ray Disc (BD), often known simply as Blu-ray, is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 2005 and released on June 20, 2006 worldwide. It is designed to supersede the DVD format, and capable of st ...
.
References
External links
*
*
*
*
*
*
''Five Graves to Cairo''
on Lux Radio Theater
''Lux Radio Theatre'', sometimes spelled ''Lux Radio Theater'', a classic radio anthology series, was broadcast on the NBC Blue Network (1934–35) (owned by the National Broadcasting Company, later predecessor of American Broadcasting Company ...
: December 13, 1943
{{Billy Wilder
1943 films
1943 romantic drama films
1940s war drama films
American black-and-white films
American romantic drama films
American war drama films
American films based on plays
Films directed by Billy Wilder
Films scored by Miklós Rózsa
Films set in 1942
Films set in hotels
Films with screenplays by Billy Wilder
Films with screenplays by Charles Brackett
Cultural depictions of Erwin Rommel
North African campaign films
Paramount Pictures films
World War II films made in wartime
World War II spy films
1940s English-language films