The
lowdown: Made in 1956, 'The Battle of the River Plate'
depicts the true story of the first major naval battle of the Second World
War, when the Allies sent
a fleet of warships to hunt down and destroy a German pocket battleship,
the Admiral Graf Spee. The ship
had been successfully attacking
Allied merchantmen during the early months of the war, and the British
Admiralty assembled a group
cruisers with the express
aim of destroying the Graf Spee. The vessels were the HMS Exeter,
HMS
Ajax and the Royal New Zealand
Navy's HMS Achilles.
The film stars Anthony Quayle, John Gregson and Ian Hunter as the captains
of the three Allied ships, and Peter
Finch as the Admiral Graf
Spee's captain, Hans Langsdorff. It also features a number of other well-known
actors in smaller roles, such
as Christopher Lee, Patrick
Macnee and John Le Mesurier, while Roger Delgado has a brief cameo (less
than two minutes!) as Captain
Captain Varela of the Uruguyan
Navy near the end of the film.
The first half focuses on
the hunt for the Graf Spee and the battle between the vessels. The
Allied ships and the Graf Spee all sustain
damage during the battle,
but all stayed afloat, and at this point the focus of the film shifts to
the Graf Spee, which seeks harbour in
the neutral port of Montevideo.
However, the Uruguayan authorities insist that Langsdorff comply with international
law, which required
the Germans to make sufficient
repairs to enable the Graf Spee to leave port within 72 hours. British
diplomats in Uruguay implement
delaying tactics in an attempt
to keep the Graf Spee in port long enough for a fleet of Allied
ships to reach Montevideo. The British also
use false intelillegence
to convince Langsdorff that a fleet of ships is waiting for it outside
the three-mile limit, but in reality it comprised
only the ships that had
initially engaged the Graf Spee. However, believing that his ship
faces impossible odds of survival, Langsdorff
elects to take the Graf
Spee out of port with a skeleton crew and scuttle it rather than allow
his crew to die in a futile battle that they
cannot win.
The
verdict: The Battle of the River Plate' is an excellent
war film for those who enjoy the genre, and features some superb battle
scenes and great acting,
particularly by Peter Finch. While the film is largely from the British
point of view, it portrays the Germans
much more sympathetically
than many films of the era. Langsdorff in particular is portrayed as an
honourable man who ultimately
puts the safety of his crew
ahead of his loyalty to the Fatherland.
Video
Clip: Captain
Varela
2.7mb |
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