Customer Reviews

The Battle of the River Plate [Region 2]

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(10)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

If you'd like to see how talk and diplomatic maneuvering in the hands of two masterful filmmakers can turn what could have been a routine action movie into something special, try Powell and Pressburger's The Battle of the River Plate. It's late 1939 and WWII has started. The German pocket battleship Graf Spee is wreaking havoc with British shipping. Three British cruisers led by Commodore Henry Harwood (Anthony Quayle) are in pursuit. Harwood makes an educated guess that Captain Hans Langsdorff (Peter Finch) will head toward South America for one last series of kills before returning home. He's right, and the first part of the movie is a brutal sea battle between the Graf Spee, which has 11-inch guns and hits harder, farther and faster than anything the British have, and HMS Exeter, HMNZS Achilles and HMS Ajax. They are determined to kill the Graf Spee, even though they only have 6-inch and 8-inch guns. The result? Exeter is badly damaged and must try to make it to the Falklands. Achilles and Ajax are damaged, too, but so is the Graf Spee. Langsdorff disengages and heads for neutral Montevideo, trailed by Achilles and Ajax.

And now we get to the heart of the movie. Under the laws of the sea, Langsdorff has two days to make the Graf Spee seaworthy before he must return to sea. He is low on ammunition. If he leaves the harbor with guns blazing he just might be able to take out Ajax and Achilles. After first working to insure Langsdorff is given no more time to affect repairs, the British realize that there is a chance that at least one British ship, a heavy cruiser, could arrive in time for battle. That would change the odds dramatically against Langsdorff. So now the British cleverly set false rumors that British warships are just beyond the horizon and ready for battle. They've placed Langsdorff in a crucial dilemma. If, he thinks, he leaves harbor now he faces a strengthened British force and will probably loose. If he waits for further repairs the situation won't improve. He could make a dash for Buenos Aires, not far away. Although Argentina is neutral it is friendly to Germany. But the channel is narrow and shallow. If the Graf Spee goes aground it will be a sitting target for the reinforced British. Langsdorff has no stomach for the fiery and pointless death of his sailors. All this is played out in meetings, telephone conversations and messages, all swirling around the diplomats of three countries, Britain, Germany and Uruguay. Langsdorff has little time to decide. Thanks to the British setting up false rumors, his choices all seem poor. But perhaps, in Langsdorff's mind, an immediate attempt at escape might be the least unattractive. He realizes there is a further choice, which is unexpected.

Powell and Pressburger have given us a clever film without clichés. No tearful wives, no anxious or two-timing sweethearts, no sailors used as lower-class comedy relief, no noble sacrifices to save others and no slimy Nazis. Powell uses the device of captured British captains held on the Graf Spee as a way to give us matter-of-fact interplay between the British and the Germans. One captured captain is used as a means for Langsdorff to explain to him (and Powell and Pressburger to explain to us) what the Graf Spee does, how strong it is, how it is supplied and the kind of man Langsdorff is. Powell and Pressburger use the discussions between Harwood and his fighting captains to help us understand Harwood's strategy and the battle tactics he's employing. The battle itself, filmed in the Mediterranean using ships from the navies of Britain and other countries, including a heavy cruiser from the U.S. to stand in for the Graf Spee, is dramatically and efficiently filmed. Almost no models were used except at the explosive conclusion.

But it is the "inaction" half of this action movie which is so cleverly worked out. Powell and Pressburger manage to keep us highly involved with the diplomatic to-and-froing. The fact that the people of Montevideo were fascinated with this giant German pocket battleship in their harbor is played to the hilt. The fate of the Graf Spee at the conclusion of the movie is watched from the harbor walls by thousands, all the while an American broadcaster is giving to radio listeners a description of what is occurring. It's quite an effective scene...and it actually happened.

The Battle of the River Plate, if made by anyone other than Powell and Pressburger, might well be seen as a quirky classic of its genre. But the great films of these two were in the past. They would make one more movie the next year, a film Powell called nothing more than a programmer, and they would then go, still friends, their separate ways. The partnership that gave us The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp, A Matter of Life and Death, The Red Shoes, I Know Where I'm Going, A Canterbury Tale and Black Narcissus was over. We're left with these great and wonderful films. If The Battle of the River Plate is not one of them, it still is an effective, professional and clever movie, and so typical of the way these two men avoided conventionality.

The Region 2 DVD has received digital restoration and looks first rate. The Technicolor glows. The sea battle could be a lesson in how a director can keep the audience emotionally excited and involved, yet still insure that they understand what they're seeing. Incidently, at the time these comments were posted, AmazonUK was selling this DVD at a terrific bargain price

This is a fine film based on real events. Late in 1939, a few months after Britain's entry into the war, three small Royal Navy cruisers go after the Graf Spee, a powerful German pocket battleship, in the South Atlantic. The British vessels although savaged by the heavier weight of fire of the Graf Spee ultimately succeed due mainly to good tactics and persistence. The acting is excellent as are the characterizations. British and German naval officers are depicted in a human and balanced way, not always the case with mid-1950s war movies. Chivalry was not dead during this battle and the film makers respectfully acknowledge that.

Some of the battle scenes employing ship models may seem a bit shaky to those viewers accustomed to computer enhanced images. Also, as another reviewer has noted, the use of a U.S. cruiser, replete with national markings, as a stand in for the Graf Spee is a bit of stretch.

Definitely a good movie, Battle of the River Plate, brings to the screen the story of the German pocket battleship Graf Spee and its encounter with the HMS Exeter, the HMS Achilles, and the HMS Ajax, off the coast of Uruguay in South America.
The setting is 1939. German and British naval forces are fighting it out across the world, and for the British finding the Graf Spee could make all the difference between survival and capitulation.
All the actors carry out their performances very well.
The only major setback is that Battle of the River Plate is a 1957 film and compared to modern films, or even epics of the time such as Guns of Navarone and other war movies, falls short of being a masterpiece.
Nevertheless, the film combines drama, action, and adventure, making it highly enjoyable.
The setting, the music and the costumes are all wonderful, though the dialogues could have been better.
History, Intrigue, Duty, and Honor, are all about.
Battle of the River Plate is a movie worth watching, especially for those with a soft spot for History!

This is one of the best World War II films ever made. Based on a real episode of the naval war in the Atlantic, it is an entirely accurate account of the battle between the German Battle Cruiser Graf Spee and her British pursuers. Filled with exciting naval action the movie uses actual film (not models) of the engagement. A first rate cast (including Anthony Quayle, John Gregson and Peter Finch) gives excellent performances all around.

This film is truly one of the best WWII naval films ever made, in my opinion. Fine acting, great actions shots, solid directing and editing, and a clear, straight forward story all combine to make superb film.

Others here have provided the synopsis of this film, so I will forgo the pleasure. While certain parts of the film did not actually occur, they were obviously added to tell the story in a clear and unambiguous way. One part this is 100% accurate is the see-sawing the British did with their position on the Graf Spee leaving harbor. Unlike many WWII naval engagements, this battle actually did take place in good weather, with pretty calm seas, as depicted in the film.

Unlike many war movies, like a Saving Private Ryan, this movie could not be made today anywhere near as well as it was in 1956. The reason-the real stars of the film, the cruisers, simply don't exist anymore. There are only two WWII light cruisers left in the world, the HMS Belfast in London, and the USS Little Rock in Buffalo, and only one heavy cruiser, the USS Salem, in Massachusetts, (which portrayed the Graf Spee in this film), and none of them are sea worthy. Models and even the best CG simply cannot provide the realism that the real thing provides, thus this movie could not be made today.

Scenes shot in places like gun turrets, shots of medium to large caliber naval guns going off, etc. can never be filmed again, as they simply don't exist and never will again. Thus, any student of naval history or WWII history needs to see this film.

One of my favorite WWII naval films, one I was thrilled to be able to buy and watch again.

I first saw this film when I was three years old, and now having seen it at least forty times in the last fifty-four years it has become an old friend. Now I have purchased it on DVD and I can highly recommend this version. It is uncut, letterboxed and the color hasn't looked this good since I first saw the film in 1956. And for me this film just gets better with time. An excellent cast giving great performances, great direction and camerawork and an attention to detail almost unmatched by any other war film. The use of actual warships instead of miniatures was also a huge plus. And while the action moves on to the land after the battle, the suspense never lets up, with the diplomatic wrangling every bit as interesting as the battle itself. About the only thing missing was Captain Langsdorf's suicide three days after the scuttling, but I think the producers were wise to omit this and allowed the film to end on an upbeat note. An excellent film about one of the last classic surface actions we shall ever see. And hats off to the people at Hen's Tooth Video for their beautiful presentation of my favorite film.

I like this film. As Uruguayan, I've heard of this battle since I was a kid, and I expected this film with great interest in 1957, when I saw it for the first time. I was 15 then, and I was a great fan of british films, specially war films like MALTA STORY, ABOVE US THE WAVES and THE CRUEL SEA. The film was accurate in some details, like the presence of our Foreign Affairs Minister Alberto Guani, and the British Ambassador Sir Eugene Millington Drake. Some scenes filmed in Montevideo (in 1956) failed showing a modern city far away from the 1939 real one, but the worst of all (and I always wished that the scene were cut from the footage) was a tropical bar called Manolo's (and Manolo was no other that Christopher Lee with spanish accent) that could never exist in Montevideo in 1939 and never before or after. The producers, trying to put some local color, invented a place (which includes a drunken and ridiculous gaucho) more typical than Cuba or the Caribbean islands than the European and culturous Montevideo. Wrong and hateful, but now, over 50 years after, I can take it with humor, forget the outrageous vignette and enjoy the rest, with Peter Finch as Langsdorff, Anthony Quayle as Admiral Harwood and many others good british actors including the old and lovable Bernard Lee, in (for me at least) an unforgettable scene when a German Officer of the Graf Spee informs the British prisoners that the war is over for them, since they've arrived in the neutral port of Montevideo. Lee shows an enormous relief, opens the door to the deck and see the silouette of Montevideo at dawn. Then we can see colorful takes of the city at night, with several places that don't exist anymore but remain in the film in glorious Technicolor and VistaVision. Since Uruguay doesn't use to appear in big movie productions, this one was an exception by that time. I still look at it with nostalgia and affection.

This isn't a review of the film 'The Battle Of The River Plate,' it's a review of the recently released US market DVD of the movie.


The DVD bears a fine digital transfer of a nicely cleaned-up, restored, color-corrected VistAVision widescreen print (a 1983 print, I think) of 'The Battle Of The River Plate'; the transfer's only shortcomings are minor - two short moments at which the soundtrack of score and dialogue slurs noticeably.


The DVD lacks subtitle tracks both in other tongues and in English (some of the fast-spoken British English dialogue is likely to be lost to American and other non-British anglophone viewers). The lone special feature is a 22-minute disappointingly lackluster production in which vague generalities are spoken, by individuals not identified by chyron subtitle (though viewers of my age should instantly recognize Christopher Lee who, by the way, provides here the only anecdote from the film's shooting), of Powell-Pressburger films and of this DVD's title subject, and most of the footage in this afterthought of a feature consists of scenes lifted directly from the restored film that was the main reason I - and perhaps also you - bought the disc to enjoy. It would have been preferable if some discussion of scriptwriting, production planning, casting, location shoots and technology were included in such a feature on a DVD of a cinema classic. Moreover, the audio volume on the 22-minute special feature is quite needlessly, shall we say, irregular - it's all over the place as it switches between scenes from the film and latter-day commentary by those unidentified individuals, so your remote's VOLUME button's going to get a workout.


For the film itself, then, four stars because, with understanding nods to its period use of rear-screen projection and bathtub special effects, it does a fine job of depicting a classic sea battle, one of the last sea battles fought visually -before the introduction of shipboard radar - and solely with warships' main gun armament. For the restored digitized print on the DVD, five stars for a lovely restoration job well done. For the DVD, owing to its lack of subtitle tracks and its lone, poor, rather slapdash afterthought of a 22-minute special feature, two and a half stars.

This reveiw is for Hen's Tooth Video's recent DVD of this film.
The DVD quality is excellent. It is in anamorphic 1.85:1 widescreen, and the picture quality is fantastic. Like most Michael Powell productions, it is a beautifully photographed film.
The DVD also has a 24-minute featurette, which includes interveiws with some of the surviving crewmembers, such as Christopher Lee. This DVD extra has some information, but not a lot. It actually leaves the veiwer with more questions than answers.
THE BATTLE OF THE RIVER PLATE/PURSUIT OF THE GRAF SPEE is highly recommended to WWII buffs, history fans and lovers of classic British cinema. Hen's Tooth Video should be commended for making this rare film available on Region 1 DVD.

Outstanding video quality, better than restored videos of this era. The Graf Spee was represented by a US heavy cruiser, CG 139. The clipper bow was never used on a German ship, but the story line has the Germans on the ship trying to make the ship look like a US cruiser. Very plausable, the German pocket battlship would need only a couple of minutes confusion to cause damage.

British cruisers were actual ships, so action sequances were as close as the actual battle as possible. The director left out any sex stories, all the better, although there is one singer who was stunning.

Story also did not show German Captain committing sucicide.

If you like naval battles this is pretty good, up there with Sink the Bismark.