It's early in the war and some of the Belgian Air Force pilots manage to escape in their Hurricanes to England, where they join the RAF, which needs all the pilots it can get.
However, they've left their regimental flag behind, buried somewhere on the grounds of a Flemish farm. Clifford Evans is dispatched to retrieve it after the Battle of Britain. Of course, Belgium by this time is occupied by the Germans, all of whom are brutal, humorless, and efficient.
Not much action but a good deal of suspense as Evans works his way through the Belgian underground and overground to find the flag and get it back to its proper place in England. People die, willingly, in his aid.
There are one or two poignant moments. One is when Evans first learns from his Commanding Officer in Britain that his best friend and colleague, Matagne, has been shot down and killed. Evans' response is wordless. He accepts a cigarette from his CO, stares at it, and it drops from his fingers.
Another touching scene has Evans meeting his mother in the park of a Flemish village after his return. The park is under surveillance by the Nazis, and the two can only sit on a bench pretending to ignore one another while speaking under their breaths. The old lady briefly touches his hand before leaving.
The acting is competent. There are no bravura scenes. And the direction is better than might be expected in a film made under war-time conditions in Britain. Clive Brook is giving himself up to be shot in order to save some hostages and as he walks to his doom at Gestapo headquarters he's followed by a noisy woman who chatters on about villagers who, she believes, may be Jewish communists. He tries to put her off, having intimations of mortality on his mind, but she persists in noisily following him. The dramatic music swells until we can no longer hear her complaints. It's a simple device, but it required some thoughtfulness on somebody's part.
It can be asked whether a flag is worth so much risk, so many deaths. It's a piece of cloth after all and the only value it has is the value we attribute to it. Historically, flags had practical functions. Amid the confusion and smoke of battle, flags provided rallying points for military units. But whatever a flag's current value in real life, in 1943, in the movies, it was a symbol for something else.
Rather neatly done.
However, they've left their regimental flag behind, buried somewhere on the grounds of a Flemish farm. Clifford Evans is dispatched to retrieve it after the Battle of Britain. Of course, Belgium by this time is occupied by the Germans, all of whom are brutal, humorless, and efficient.
Not much action but a good deal of suspense as Evans works his way through the Belgian underground and overground to find the flag and get it back to its proper place in England. People die, willingly, in his aid.
There are one or two poignant moments. One is when Evans first learns from his Commanding Officer in Britain that his best friend and colleague, Matagne, has been shot down and killed. Evans' response is wordless. He accepts a cigarette from his CO, stares at it, and it drops from his fingers.
Another touching scene has Evans meeting his mother in the park of a Flemish village after his return. The park is under surveillance by the Nazis, and the two can only sit on a bench pretending to ignore one another while speaking under their breaths. The old lady briefly touches his hand before leaving.
The acting is competent. There are no bravura scenes. And the direction is better than might be expected in a film made under war-time conditions in Britain. Clive Brook is giving himself up to be shot in order to save some hostages and as he walks to his doom at Gestapo headquarters he's followed by a noisy woman who chatters on about villagers who, she believes, may be Jewish communists. He tries to put her off, having intimations of mortality on his mind, but she persists in noisily following him. The dramatic music swells until we can no longer hear her complaints. It's a simple device, but it required some thoughtfulness on somebody's part.
It can be asked whether a flag is worth so much risk, so many deaths. It's a piece of cloth after all and the only value it has is the value we attribute to it. Historically, flags had practical functions. Amid the confusion and smoke of battle, flags provided rallying points for military units. But whatever a flag's current value in real life, in 1943, in the movies, it was a symbol for something else.
Rather neatly done.