I See a Dark Stranger

Infobox Film
name = I See a Dark Stranger


image_size =
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director = Frank Launder
producer = Sidney Gilliat
Frank Launder
writer = Sidney Gilliat
Frank Launder (story and screenplay)
Wolfgang Wilhelm
Liam Redmond (add. dialog)
narrator =
starring = Deborah Kerr
Trevor Howard
music =
cinematography =
editing =
distributor =
released = July 4 1946
runtime = 112 minutes (98 minutes in the US)
country = UK
language = English
budget =
gross =
preceded_by =
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website =
amg_id = 1:24132
imdb_id = 0038289

"I See a Dark Stranger" (American title: "The Adventuress") is a British 1946 World War II spy film by the team of Frank Launder and Sidney Gilliat, starring Deborah Kerr and Trevor Howard.

Plot

During World War II, when nationalistic Irishwoman Bridie Quilty (Deborah Kerr) turns 21, she sets out to fulfill her lifelong dream. She leaves her small rural village and goes to Dublin. On the way, she shares a train compartment with J. Miller (Raymond Huntley), but believing him to be English, she is very brusque with him. Once in the city, she seeks out a famous ex-radical her father had supposedly fought alongside, Michael O'Callaghan (Brefni O'Rorke), and asks him to help her join the Irish Republican Army. However, he has mellowed as the situation in Ireland has improved and tries unsuccessfully to dissuade her from her overly romantic notion.

Miller turns out to be a secret agent assigned to break Nazi spy Oscar Pryce (David Ward) out of a British prison for what he knows. When, by sheer chance, he runs into Bridey again, he recruits her for his task. She gets a job in a pub/hotel near the prison and becomes acquainted with a sergeant, who unwittingly provides her with information about the prisoner's impending transfer.

This is the opportunity that Miller has been waiting for. However, he is disturbed by the arrival of Lieutenant David Baynes (Trevor Howard), a British officer on leave, since there is little to attract anyone to the town. He suspects the newcomer of being a counter-intelligence agent. He therefore orders Bridey to distract Baynes on the day of the transfer by having her take him on a date. David begins to fall in love with Bridie, despite her unconcealed anti-British sentiments. As it turns out, David is merely there to gather material for his thesis on Oliver Cromwell, a man Bridey loathes intensely.

Miller succeeds in freeing Pryce, but both are shot later fleeing from a roadblock. Pryce tells Miller where he hid a notebook, then remains behind to delay their pursuers. Miller manages to make his way to Bridie and gives her the location to pass along. Then, unwilling to risk seeing a doctor, he tells her to dispose of his body after he is dead. Afterward, Bridie boards a train as instructed, but her contact, an elderly woman (Katie Johnson, of "The Ladykillers" fame), is arrested before any exchange can take place. Not knowing what else to do, Bridie decides to return home.

However, she encounters David, who followed her aboard the train, and changes her mind. She goes to the Isle of Man instead to retrieve the book. She is trailed by David and a German spy (Norman Shelley). The Nazi and his cohorts eventually abduct her. When David tracks them to a boat, he is caught as well. Bridie has figured out that the information they want has to do with the imminent D-Day invasion, which would involve Irishmen, so she refuses to tell what she knows.

The two prisoners are taken to Ireland. The group ends up behind a funeral procession that is actually a smuggling operation transporting alarm clocks, among other things. When one goes off in the coffin at the border crossing to Northern Ireland, Bridie and David escape in the resulting confusion. David phones for the police from a pub, mistakenly believing that they are still in Ireland, where Bridie would merely be interned. When he realizes that they are actually in Northern Ireland, and that Bridie is in danger of being shot as a spy, he tries to convince her to flee, but she insists on staying. Then, they hear on the radio that D-Day has begun. Her information now useless, she escapes across the border. David finds the Nazi spies in the same pub and a fight breaks out. The police arrive and arrest everybody.

After the war ends, Bridie and David get married. However, their marriage gets off to a rocky start when David chooses the Cromwell Arms for their honeymoon lodgings.

Reception

Cast

*Deborah Kerr as Bridie Quilty
*Trevor Howard as Lieutenant David Baynes
*Raymond Huntley as J. Miller
*Michael Howard as Hawkins
*Norman Shelley as Man in Straw Hat, a German spy
*Liam Redmond as Uncle Timothy
*Brefni O'Rorke as Michael O'Callaghan
*James Harcourt as Grandfather
*George Woodbridge as Walter
*Garry Marsh as Captain Goodhusband, comically inept security officer stationed on the Isle of Man
*Olga Lindo as Mrs. Edwards
*Tom Macaulay as Lieutenant Spanswick, Goodhusband's more astute subordinate
*David Ward as Oscar Pryce
*Harry Hutchinson as Chief Mourner/Smuggler
*Harry Webster as Uncle Joe

References

Notes

Bibliography

*The Great British Films, pp 94-96, Jerry Vermilye, 1978, Citadel Press, ISBN 080650661X

External links

* [http://www.noiroftheweek.com/2008/05/i-see-dark-stranger-1946.html Film Noir of the Week commentary with video trailer]
*imdb title|id=0038289|title=I See a Dark Stranger
* [http://www.screenonline.org.uk/film/id/485233/ screenonline entry]