Comrade X | |
---|---|
Directed by | King Vidor |
Screenplay by | Ben Hecht Charles Lederer Herman J. Mankiewicz (uncredited) |
Story by | Walter Reisch |
Produced by | Gottfried Reinhardt King Vidor |
Starring | Clark Gable Hedy Lamarr Oskar Homolka Felix Bressart Eve Arden |
Cinematography | Joseph Ruttenberg |
Edited by | Harold F. Kress |
Music by | Bronislau Kaper |
Production company | |
Distributed by | Loew's Inc. |
Release date |
|
Running time | 90 minutes |
Country | United States |
Language | English |
Budget | $920,000 [1] |
Box office | $2 million [1] |
Comrade X is a 1940 American comedy spy film directed by King Vidor and starring Clark Gable and Hedy Lamarr. The supporting cast features Oskar Homolka, Felix Bressart, Sig Rumann and Eve Arden. In February 2020, the film was shown at the 70th Berlin International Film Festival, as part of a retrospective dedicated to King Vidor's career. [2]
In 1940, a foreign reporter, “Comrade X”, is bypassing censors and sending out critical stories about the Soviet Union. Commissar Vasiliev, chief of the secret police, announces that he has taken over the censorship of the press. His predecessor, Comrade Molkov, who was “not watching his step” has been the victim of a “traffic accident.” All reporters will be restricted, unable to leave Moscow without permits. McKinley "Mac" Thompson, secretly "Comrade X", pretends to be an irresponsible alcoholic who skips the news conference.
German reporter Van Hofer has taken over Mac’s room, which Mac has paid for in advance and “fixed up.” “Is this a nice way for a Nazi to act?” Mac asks Van Hofer. Reporter Jane Wilson informs Mac that the funeral will be held that day of Comrade Molkov, shot by his old pal, Commissar Vasiliev, who will now cry over Molkov's grave. Mac pretends to care only about the reception, and Jane expresses disappointment that he was once “the best reporter in the business.” Van Hofer arrives with the Russian hotel manager, complaining that the American has invaded his space. The conversation is interrupted by a phone call, which Mac pretends is the American news bureau notifying that Germany has declared war on Russia (ironically months before Germany’s invasion of Russia actually happened). The indignant Russian manager kicks the German Van Hofer out of the room.
At Molkov’s funeral, Mac spots a pallbearer signal by knocking on the coffin. Using a camera disguised as a portable radio, Mac takes a photo as the assassin rises out of the coffin to shoot at Commissar Vasiliev. Mac hides the film.
Mac’s identity is discovered by his valet, Vanya, who blackmails him into promising to get his daughter, Golubka, out of the country. Golubka, a streetcar conductor, is called “Theodore” because only males are allowed to drive streetcars. Theodore is an idealistic communist, which Mac and Jane proclaim “the worst thing you can be in the Soviet Union.” Communists are full of ideals dangerous to authorities, so the Communists are executed so that Communism can succeed.
Riding Theodore’s streetcar, Mac pretends to admire the Soviet Union and expresses a wish to help her spread communist ideals in the US. Although initially suspicious of Mac’s motives, with her mentor Bastakoff’s blessing (eager to get rid of a pesky fanatical idealist), Theodore agrees to a sham marriage so she can spread the virtues of Communism to the rest of the world. Unable to marry as “Theodore,” she now takes the name of “Lizvanetchka” (Lizzie), a revolutionary martyr. On their wedding night, Lizzie shows Mac a photo of her idol, Bastakoff, whom Mac recognizes as Vasiliev’s attempted assassin. Jane arrives to ask Mac to file a story for her in the US and exposes Mac as anti-Soviet. After she leaves, the secret police arrive to take Mac and Lizzie for questioning by Commissar Vasiliev.
Awaiting Vasiliev, Mac pretends to not recognize his own radio-camera, which was found in Vanya’s room. To protect Mac and Lizzie, Vanya claims he is Comrade X, showing how cutouts in “his" handkerchief can be used to decipher messages. Mac, Lizzie, and Vanya are arrested. A group of Bastakoff’s followers are imprisoned with them and Lizzie proclaims they would all rather die than betray Bastakoff. Mac relays a proposition to Vasiliev via a guard. He will tell Vasiliev the identity of the man who tried to assassinate him and provide a photograph of the attempt.
When Mac is escorted to “Vasiliev”, he finds Bastakoff is now chief of police. Vasiliev has died of “pneumonia.” The photograph is embarrassing to Bastakoff―as are the 100 Bastakoff followers executed at Bastakoff’s orders to prove his loyalty to the new government. Mac gives Bastakoff the incriminating photo but withholds the negative. Bastakoff exchanges the lives of Lizzie, Vanya, and Mac for the negative, which Mac is to retrieve.
Knowing that Bastakoff will not keep his word―Lizzie now disillusioned―they evade the secret police trailing them, and the three hide on a train hauling tanks. Appropriating a tank, which Lizzie has been trained to drive, they cross the border into Romania, where they surrender and successfully reach the US.
Gable prophetically jokes that "Germany just invaded Russia" and "Panzer tanks are rolling into Ukraine" to get the Russian hotel manager to kick the German reporter out of his room. Less than a year after release, Germany did indeed invade Russia and the Ukrainian SSR. [3]
Pre-war American films such as Comrade X and Ninotchka depict the Soviet Union as backwards, dreary, depressing and totalitarian. After the United States entered the war on Russia's side, however, Hollywood's depictions of Russians immediately changed to brave, honorable, freedom-loving liberators. The UK specifically pulled Comrade X from the cinemas. [4]
At one point in the movie, after McKinley feeds vodka to his secretary Olga and embraces her, Golubka enters his room and the women engage in a "hair pulling battle" for his affections that Variety described as “a honey." [5] [6]
According to MGM records the film earned $1,520,000 in the US and Canada and $559,000 elsewhere resulting in a profit of $484,000. [1]
Ninotchka is a 1939 American romantic comedy film made for Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer by producer and director Ernst Lubitsch and starring Greta Garbo and Melvyn Douglas. It was written by Billy Wilder, Charles Brackett, and Walter Reisch, based on a story by Melchior Lengyel. Ninotchka marked the first comedy role for Garbo, and her penultimate film; she received her third and final Academy Award nomination for Best Actress. In 1990, Ninotchka was selected for preservation in the United States National Film Registry by the Library of Congress as being "culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant". In 2011, Time also included the film on the magazine's list of "All-Time 100 Movies".
Hedy Lamarr was an Austrian-born American actress and inventor. After a brief early film career in Czechoslovakia, including the controversial erotic romantic drama Ecstasy (1933), she fled from her first husband, Friedrich Mandl, and secretly moved to Paris. Traveling to London, she met Louis B. Mayer, who offered her a film contract in Hollywood. Lamarr became a film star with her performance in the romantic drama Algiers (1938). She achieved further success with the Western Boom Town (1940) and the drama White Cargo (1942). Lamarr's most successful film was the religious epic Samson and Delilah (1949). She also acted on television before the release of her final film in 1958. She was honored with a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1960.
Samson and Delilah is a 1949 American romantic biblical drama film produced and directed by Cecil B. DeMille and released by Paramount Pictures. It depicts the biblical story of Samson, a strongman whose secret lies in his uncut hair, and his love for Delilah, the woman who seduces him, discovers his secret, and then betrays him to the Philistines. It stars Victor Mature and Hedy Lamarr in the title roles, George Sanders as the Saran, Angela Lansbury as Semadar, and Henry Wilcoxon as Prince Ahtur.
Theodore Meir Bikel was an Austrian actor, folk singer, musician, composer, unionist, and political activist. He appeared in films, including The African Queen (1951), Moulin Rouge (1952), The Kidnappers (1953), The Enemy Below (1957), I Want to Live! (1958), My Fair Lady (1964), The Russians Are Coming, the Russians Are Coming (1966), and 200 Motels (1971). For his portrayal of Sheriff Max Muller in The Defiant Ones (1958), he was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor.
Stepan Georgevich Shaumian was an Armenian Bolshevik revolutionary and politician active throughout the Caucasus. His role as a leader of the Russian Revolution in the Caucasus earned him the nickname of the "Caucasian Lenin", a reference to Russian revolutionary leader Vladimir Lenin.
Karla Leanne Homolka, also known as Karla Leanne Teale, Leanne Teale and Leanne Bordelais, is a Canadian serial killer who acted as an accomplice to her husband, Paul Bernardo, taking active part in the rapes and murders of at least three minors in Ontario – including her own sister, Tammy Homolka – between 1990 and 1992.
Georgy Vasilyevich Chicherin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and a Soviet politician who served as the first People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs in the Soviet government from March 1918 to July 1930.
Andrei Sergeyevich KonchalovskyOZO is a Russian filmmaker. He has worked in Soviet, Hollywood, and contemporary Russian cinema. He is a laureate of the Order "For Merit to the Fatherland", a National Order of the Legion of Honour, an Officer of the Order of Arts and Letters, a Cavalier of the Order of Merit of the Italian Republic and a People's Artist of the RSFSR. He is the son of writer Sergey Mikhalkov, and the brother of filmmaker Nikita Mikhalkov.
Lyudmila Mikhailovna Pavlichenko was a Soviet sniper in the Red Army during World War II. She is credited with killing 309 enemy combatants. She served in the Red Army during the siege of Odessa and the siege of Sevastopol, during the early stages of the fighting on the Eastern Front.
Siegfried Carl Alban Rumann, billed as Sig Ruman and Sig Rumann, was a German-American character actor known for his portrayals of pompous and often stereotypically Teutonic officials or villains in more than 100 films.
Austrian Americans are Americans of Austrian descent, chiefly German-speaking Catholics and Jews. According to the 2000 U.S. census, there were 735,128 Americans of full or partial Austrian descent, accounting for 0.3% of the population. The states with the largest Austrian American populations are New York (93,083), California (84,959), Pennsylvania (58,002), Florida (54,214), New Jersey (45,154), and Ohio (27,017).
Felix Bressart was a German-born actor of stage and screen whose career spanned both Europe and Hollywood.
Song of Russia is a 1944 American war film made and distributed by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The picture was credited as being directed by Gregory Ratoff, though Ratoff became ill near the end of the five-month production, and was replaced by László Benedek, who completed principal photography; the credited screenwriters were Paul Jarrico and Richard J. Collins. The film stars Robert Taylor, Susan Peters, and Robert Benchley.
Never Let Me Go is a 1953 British adventure romance film starring Clark Gable and Gene Tierney. The picture, directed by Delmer Daves and produced by Clarence Brown, was from a screenplay by George Froeschel and Ronald Millar, based on the 1949 novel Came the Dawn by Roger Bax.
Tushino was a former general aviation airfield located in Tushino, northwest Moscow, Russia. During the Cold War, this was the site of military exercises showcasing the latest in Soviet innovation. These exercises were held on Soviet Air Fleet Day. Nowadays, the grounds are the site of the Otkritie Arena, the home of FC Spartak Moscow, one of Russia's leading football clubs.
Sarkis Theodorosi Galajyan was an Armenian-Soviet general and a political officer.
Our Own is a 2004 Russian action drama film directed by Dmitri Meskhiyev.
Alexis Granowsky, born Abram Mikhaylovich Azarkh, was a Russian theatre director who later became a film director.
Leo Lania was a journalist, playwright and screenwriter.
An agit-train was a locomotive engine with special auxiliary cars outfitted for propaganda purposes by the Bolshevik government of Soviet Russia during the time of the Russian Civil War, War Communism, and the New Economic Policy. Brightly painted and carrying on board a printing press, government complaint office, printed political leaflets and pamphlets, library books, and a mobile movie theater, agit-trains traveled the rails of Russia, Siberia, and Ukraine in an attempt to introduce the values and program of the new revolutionary government to a scattered and isolated peasantry.