This is a real bow-wow.
Errol Flynn stars in "Northern Pursuit," a 1943 propaganda film directed by Raoul Walsh. It also stars Helmut Dantine, Gene Lockhart, and Julie Bishop.
Walsh told a story of how Jack Warner used to call him up to his office and tell him he had to direct a script for him. Warner would have no details, not even the cast. "Some bum," he would say, when Walsh asked him who was in it. This scenario might have been the case for "Northern Pursuit." Flynn and Walsh were very close friends, but they both might have been blind-sided into this one by dear old Jack.
The premise story concerns Nazis in Canada who are trying to get way into the Canadian wilderness, where parts of a bomber have been hidden. Once assembled, it's going to take out the St. Lawrence Seaway. More than a little preposterous. Flynn is a mountie whose character is of German descent, so he goes undercover and, knowing the area, helps the Nazis on their journey.
Even if you ignore this plot, and you have to in order to get through the movie, it's pretty slow going. There are some exciting scenes, but this isn't your usual Flynn adventure film. Helmut Dantine and Gene Lockhart give excellent performances, though, and handsome, charismatic Flynn does as well as he can given the circumstances.
A youngster on this board trashed this movie, the 1940s audiences, and propaganda films in general, making mention of the "special effects." Given that this was filmed on a Warner sound stage without benefit of CGI and a computer, the film looks pretty good, with some very effective effects. I don't think the 1940s audiences were stupid -rather, I think the audiences today have been dumbed down. Propaganda movies weren't so that audiences would hate the enemy. I have a feeling they already did. They were done to keep up the morale during a very difficult time in this country. "Northern Pursuit" isn't particularly representative of the genre. When you consider the number of films the studios put out, they had a very high number of excellent ones. Okay, so this isn't one of them.
Errol Flynn stars in "Northern Pursuit," a 1943 propaganda film directed by Raoul Walsh. It also stars Helmut Dantine, Gene Lockhart, and Julie Bishop.
Walsh told a story of how Jack Warner used to call him up to his office and tell him he had to direct a script for him. Warner would have no details, not even the cast. "Some bum," he would say, when Walsh asked him who was in it. This scenario might have been the case for "Northern Pursuit." Flynn and Walsh were very close friends, but they both might have been blind-sided into this one by dear old Jack.
The premise story concerns Nazis in Canada who are trying to get way into the Canadian wilderness, where parts of a bomber have been hidden. Once assembled, it's going to take out the St. Lawrence Seaway. More than a little preposterous. Flynn is a mountie whose character is of German descent, so he goes undercover and, knowing the area, helps the Nazis on their journey.
Even if you ignore this plot, and you have to in order to get through the movie, it's pretty slow going. There are some exciting scenes, but this isn't your usual Flynn adventure film. Helmut Dantine and Gene Lockhart give excellent performances, though, and handsome, charismatic Flynn does as well as he can given the circumstances.
A youngster on this board trashed this movie, the 1940s audiences, and propaganda films in general, making mention of the "special effects." Given that this was filmed on a Warner sound stage without benefit of CGI and a computer, the film looks pretty good, with some very effective effects. I don't think the 1940s audiences were stupid -rather, I think the audiences today have been dumbed down. Propaganda movies weren't so that audiences would hate the enemy. I have a feeling they already did. They were done to keep up the morale during a very difficult time in this country. "Northern Pursuit" isn't particularly representative of the genre. When you consider the number of films the studios put out, they had a very high number of excellent ones. Okay, so this isn't one of them.