BroadcastChic Excellent, a Must See

Derry Herrera Not sure how, but this is easily one of the best movies all summer. Multiple levels of funny, never takes itself seriously, super colorful, and creative.

Mehdi Hoffman There's a more than satisfactory amount of boom-boom in the movie's trim running time.

Ezmae Chang This is a small, humorous movie in some ways, but it has a huge heart. What a nice experience.

JohnHowardReid Leslie Howard (Professor Horatio Smith), Francis L. Sullivan (General von Graum), Mary Morris (Ludmilla Koslowski), Hugh McDermott (David Maxwell), Raymond Huntley (Marx), Manning Whiley (Bertie Gregson), Peter Gawthorne (Sidimir Koslowski), Allan Jeayes (Dr Beckendorf), Dennis Arundell (Hoffman), Joan Kemp-Welch (teacher), Philip Friend (Spencer), Lawrence Kitchen (Clarence Elstead), David Tomlinson (Steve), Basil Appleby (Jock McIntyre), Percy Walsh (Dvorak), Roland Pertwee (Sir George Smith), A.E. Matthews (Earl of Meadowbrook), Aubrey Mallalieu (dean), Ernest Butcher (Weber), Ben Williams (Graubitz), Hector Abbas, Oriel Ross, George Street, Arthur Hambling, Harris Arundel, Suzanne Clare, Charles Paton, Ronald Howard, Roddy Hughes.Director: LESLIE HOWARD. Screenplay: Anatole de Grunwald. Adapted by Roland Pertwee, Ian Dalrymple and Anatole de Grunwald from an original story by A.G. MacDonell and Wolfgang Wilhelm. Photography: Mutz Greenbaum, Jack Hildyard. Film editor: Douglas Myers. Music composed by John Greenwood, directed by Muir Mathieson. Associate producer: Harold Huth. Producer: Leslie Howard. Executive producer: Edward Small. (The Suevia DVD rates 10/10).Copyright 15 December 1941 by United Artists Corp. A British National Picture. U.S. release through United Artists. New York opening at the Rivoli: 12 February 1942. U.K. release through Anglo- American: 26 July 1941. Australian release through British Empire Films: 12 March 1942. 11,003 feet. 122 minutes. U.S. release title: Mister V.SYNOPSIS: Nazi Germany before the War: a Cambridge professor and a group of students, are digging for evidence of early Aryan Civilisations. But the Professor quickly becomes the ingenious foe of the Nazi Regime. COMMENT: "Pimpernel Smith" appeared about a year after Dunkirk, and was intended to make the Nazi regime appear ridiculous. The plot of the film, as the title implies, is a variation on Baroness Orczy's novel, "The Scarlet Pimpernel". To translate the 18th century fop Sir Percy Blakeney into 20th century terms and the cunning but shabby Chauvelin into his equivalent as a Nazi agent could have been done with comparative ease. Instead, Howard has made his Pimpernel all tweeds and tobacco and forgetfulness. "Pimpernel Smith" came in third at the British box office in 1941. ("49th Parallel" was first, Chaplin's "The Great Dictator" second). The movie was equally successful in Australia — in fact was so popular it was still being commercially screened in the 1960s, one of a mere handful of wartime British product still available from Australian 35mm exchanges. You'd think that such an exceptionally popular film would regularly turn up on Australian television, wouldn't you? Hell, no! We all know what utter contempt TV program managers have for the likes and dislikes of their viewers. No "Pimpernel Smith", thank you.Despite the wartime propaganda it's still a vastly entertaining movie which oddly has dated far less than the original "Scarlet Pimpernel" which had the advantage of being set in period. Howard and Sullivan make such wonderful adversaries, and Howard has directed with such flair, making full use of some really impressive sets! Photography and other credits are equally polished. And incidentally the scene I can never forget has Howard escaping across a field, the Nazis in hot pursuit, firing wildly. Howard seems to disappear. Then the camera tracks across to a ragged scarecrow and pans slowly down its arm. Blood!

MartinHafer This film was created to drum up morale among the British people and to portray their cause as just to the Americans (who were not yet in the war). And, in this endeavor, it does a wonderful job. The Nazis are really bad and the British people plucky and decent--exactly the message they were trying to get across.This story is a reworking of THE SCARLET PIMPERNELL--being updated to the the then present time instead of during the French Reign of Terror. Leslie Howard does a fine job playing the lead and the film is a better record of his acting talents than most of his movies. The direction and writing, as well, were excellent. No complaints at all about this film. Give it a try--it's a great time passer.

theowinthrop In 1935 Leslie Howard made one of his finest films in the historic romance, THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL. He played the hero, Sir Percy Blakeney, who was a society leader but also a society twit, who spent time staring through an eyeglass criticizing the way a man's cravat was tied, or a sleeve was cut, or how Romney was painting his wife. But when alone with his intimates he was "The Scarlet Pimpernel" who planned the rescue of French aristocrats from the guillotine. He and his gang are fighting a war to the death against Citizen Chauvin (Raymond Massey), the Jacobin agent/minister to Britain, who is seeking to end the rescues. In between is his beloved, but seemingly tarnished wife (Merle Oberon) who is trying to save her captured brother, and unknowingly reveals her husband's secret to Chauvin. The conclusion of this adventure film was very exciting and surprising. But there was and is a problem with THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL. Despite Baroness Orczy's marvelous writing ability (try her detective tales of THE OLD MAN IN THE CORNER as a good follow-up), she was deeply impressed with the old order of aristocracy. Only once, in the film, did a sense of balance come through - and oddly enough out of the mouth of the villain. Merle Oberon had testified for the French Revolutionary Court against some aristocrats, dooming them (by her testimony) to death. She has never forgiven herself (and it has blackened her reputation). In bemoaning this Massey gets disgusted and spits out, "Why is it that everyone is always condemning what happened to the poor aristocrats and never think of what they did to us?!" It's a good point, but because we dislike Massey and his boss (Robespierre, of course) we never stop to consider it for long. Howard was able to repeat and improve on the original film in 1942 with PIMPERNEL SMITH, where as Professor Horatio Smith he uses his archaeological digs in Germany (for proof of an Aryan civilization before Greece or Rome) to rescue intellectuals and victims of the Nazi Reich. Here his opponent is General Von Graum (Francis L. Sullivan) who is like Chauvin in his sharpness and pomposity. He is an obvious knock at Hermann Goering (who was obese like Sullivan) and has Goering's sham bonhomie and his total vicious streak. The writer of the screenplay must have had some discussion with German refugees in the know (notice the bits about Von Graum throwing a tantrum and then turning about and offering German chocolate to someone who has come through for him). The film also uses Howard to brilliant advantage in one sequence, disguised as a bureaucrat, who he himself states was the most disagreeable person he ever thought up. The ultimately efficient German bureaucrat is totally inhuman - a talking machine of bossy efficiency. Percy Blakeney was disguised several times, as an old crone and a soldier, but never someone so disagreeable.And that is the difference. THE SCARLET PIMPERNEL deals with the 1790s and the Reign of Terror. It was a century and a half in the past, and really could not annoy the French too much (though one wonders what it's box office was like in France). Britain and Germany were at war in 1942, and the film couldn't present even one moment where Von Graum could make a comment like Chauvin's outburst. As a matter of historic record, Chauvin had some point about the sins of the Ancien Regime as opposed to the Revolutionaries. Knowing what we know now about Von Graum's buddies, he would not have been able to say much.The closing of the movie was a memorable speech by Howard, about how Germany's entrance into war was not the start of it's road to glory but to it's destruction. True enough in 1945 - 1950 or so. And when he manages to take advantage of Von Graum's brief distraction to vanish into the night, the Nazi fires his gun into the empty space. "I'll be back," we hear Howard repeat twice. It is haunting, because of his real fate of being shot down in the war by a Nazi plane. Howard physically did not return, but spiritually he did with the men at D-Day all the way to V.E.Day.

tom.mack "Pimpernel Smith" is one of the most classic movies you will ever find in the World War II era. It will ever serve as a reminder that in 1941, the world did indeed know of the existence of Concentration Camps. It will further be a testament to the murders committed there with the statement by Dr. Benkendorf (Allen Jeayes, excepting Leslie Howard, the only man to play in both Pimpernel movies) "My business is to cure, not to kill!"What makes this movie is not the plot, but the little subplots that surround the movie. You cannot watch this movie just once; it takes several times before you catch all the subtilties. Leslie Howard is just full of them in this movie.But even more interesting is the character development. We watch Professor Smith go from a hardened academic to a gentile, but compassionate man. We watch the students go from being boys to men, and we learn from Ludmilla Koz about what kind of courage a lady can have.By all means, watch this movie and watch it a lot. It will teach you in many ways.