49th Parallel

A film set in Canada during the Second World War. A German submarine is sunk in Canadian waters. Six men come ashore. The country is enemy territory and the only way out is south, to an America not yet in the war. The film follows that journey. The men meet different communities in turn: fur trappers, a Hutterite community, a writer living alone and a soldier. The idea of the structure is that every encounter is an argument. The Germans defend their order, the people they meet describe their own lives, and the film builds its position through those conversations. The section in the Hutterite community in particular sits at the centre. It was made during the war with the support of the British government, to help persuade America to enter it. The film had a function and does not hide it. Leslie Howard, Laurence Olivier, Raymond Massey and Eric Portman are in the cast. Michael Powell directed; the story is by Emeric Pressburger and won the Oscar for original story. An important example for anyone who likes wartime films and British classics. For a viewer expecting neutrality, the film was plainly made with a purpose.