WATCH ON THE RHINE Movie Review

1943 Herman Shumlin

Well-intentioned and seriously acted, Lillian Hellman and Dashiell Hammett's adaptation of her play never breaks free from the limitations of the stage. Other changes in acting styles further distance the work from contemporary audiences, and so now it is little more than a propagandistic curiosity.

Kurt Muller (Paul Lukas), his wife Sara (Bette Davis), and their three children nervously cross the border from Mexico into America. Though Sara is returning home, they're uneasy on the train back to her mother's estate in Virginia, near Washington. Fanny Farrelly (Lucile Watson), the domineering family matriarch, doesn't quite know what her daughter's been up to for the past 17 years, and she has problems of her own. Her houseguests, the Romanian Teck de Brancovis (George Coulouris) and his wife Marthe (Geraldine Fitzgerald), have overstayed their welcome. People are starting to gossip about her son David (Donald Woods) and Marthe, and Teck is far too chummy with the Nazis at the German embassy. At leisurely length, it is revealed that Kurt has been deeply involved with antifascist activities and is continuing his work.

The central problem is that none of the filmmakers were really comfortable with the medium. Director Herman Shumlin, who'd directed the play, was an established theater producer and director. (He would make only one more film, Confidential Agent.) Hellmann, too, had much more experience with conventional drama at that time. (She would gain more experience in screenwriting, including that wonderful '60s potboiler, The Chase.) Hammett's best work was done in short stories and novels. Together, they allow almost all of the action to take place in Mrs. Farrelly's living room, where the characters don't really talk to each other. Instead, they deliver a series of monologues, mostly political. Even someone who agrees with the film's politics may still find its selfrighteous “I told you so” attitude hard to stomach. Lines like “All of us haven't been so isolated as you seem to have been in this house” come across as sloganeering. Finally, the key piece of physical action—the moment that everything else builds up to—takes place off camera. In context, it's easy to see why the work would be structured that way on stage. But on screen, it's all pretty unsatisfactory.

Watch on the Rhine is also a curious counterpoint to Casablanca. Both are based on stage plays; both were released in the same year; and the characters even parallel each other. Kurt and Sara can be seen as older versions of Victor Laszlo and Ilse. Teck is Ugarte. The embassy Nazi Von Ramme (Henry Daniell) is Maj. Strasser, and in her more flamboyant moments, Lucile Watson could be Sidney Greenstreet in drag. Ironically, Paul Lukas won the Academy Award that should have gone to Humphrey Bogart.

Cast: Bette Davis (Sara Muller), Paul Lukas (Kurt Muller), Donald Woods (David Farrelly), Beulah Bondi (Anise), Geraldine Fitzgerald (Marthe de Brancovis), George Coulouris (Teck de Brancovis), Henry Daniell (Phili Von Ramme), Helmut Dantine (Young man), Donald Buka (Joshua), Anthony Caruso (Italian man), Clyde Fillmore (Sam Chandler), Howard Hickman (Penfield), Creighton Hale (Chauffeur), Kurt Katch (Herr Blecher), Clarence Muse (Horace), Alan Hale Jr. (Boy), Frank Reicher (Admiral), Mary Young (Mrs. Marie Sewell), Lucile Watson (Fanny Farrelly); Written by: Lillian Hellman, Dashiell Hammett; Cinematography by: Hal Mohr, Merritt B. Gerstad; Music by: Max Steiner. Producer: Hal B. Wallis, Warner Bros. Awards: Academy Awards '43: Best Actor (Lukas); Golden Globe Awards '44: Best Actor—Drama (Lukas); New York Film Critics Awards '43: Best Actor (Lukas), Best Film; Nominations: Academy Awards '43: Best Picture, Best Screenplay, Best Supporting Actress (Watson). Running Time: 114 minutes. Format: VHS, Beta.