SUBJECTS

Espionage, German -- Great Britain -- Drama, Submarine captains -- Drama, World War, 1914-1918 -- Europe -- Drama

The Spy in Black

(U-boat 29)

Emeric Pressburger, Michael Powell
United Kingdom, 1939

Imported Print

featuring

Conrad Veidt, Valerie Hobson, Sebastian Shaw, Marius Goring,

“I had no idea secret agent was such a comfortable profession,” remarks one to the other in Michael Powell’s highly charged (in every way) thriller set during World War I but, importantly, made in 1939. Conrad Veidt is riveting as a German submarine captain lodged in the remote Scottish Orkney Islands, from where he will attempt to sink the British fleet. Valerie Hobson is his captive, and he hers, in a quaint little house in a quaint little village. Powell and Pressburger’s first film as a creative duo, The Spy in Black is “literate, exciting, extremely well-crafted. . . . A Hitchcockian blending of humor and thrills” (William K. Everson).

FILM DETAILS 
Screenwriter
  • Emeric Pressburger
Based On

  • a novel by J. Storer Clouston, adapted by Roland Pertwee

Cinematographer
  • Bernard Browne
Print Info
  • B&W
  • 35mm
  • 82 mins
Source
  • BFI
Permission
  • Park Circus
CINEFILES

CineFiles is an online database of BAMPFA's extensive collection of documentation covering world cinema, past and present.

View The Spy in Black documents  

Matters of life and death : the films of Michael Powell (program note), Cinematheque Ontario/a division of Toronto International Film Festival Group, James Quandt, 2002

The spy in black (program note), Vancouver International Film Festival, 1995

A production of the Archers: the films of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger (program note), Film Forum (New York), 1995

The spy in black (program note), The Museum of Modern Art, New York, William K. Everson, 1981

Preview Dec. 31 - Feb.26 (program note), American Film Institute, 1981

Michael Powell: film artist (flyer), UCLA Film & Television Archive, 1981

Michael Powell (article), Films In Review, William K. Everson, 1980

Alexander Korda (program note), National Film Theatre (London, England), Karol Kulik, 1976

The films of Sir Alexander Korda (flyer), Regency Theatre

U-boat 29 (flyer), London Films, Inc.

Displaying 10 of 11 publicly available documents.


View all The Spy in Black documentation on CineFiles.