British Intelligence

I'm getting to the end of all those B movies that TCM ran during the spotlight to B movies back in July. Next up is one released at the start of the European theater of World War II, and obviously made in relation to the Nazis being the bad guys, but set during World War I: British Intelligence.

It's 1917, and World War I has more or less reached a stalemate that would eventually be broken by the arrival of the Americans. The British are trying to attack the Germans, but it seems as though every movie they make is figured out by a German agent the British only know by name, Strendler, and not appearance. They're going to have to get their best agent on the case. With that in mind, they call on a pilot, Frank Bennett (Bruce Lester) to pick up the agent.

But Bennett gets shot down and sent to a field hospital, where he's attended by nurses, including the very pretty Helen (Margaret Lindsay) while he's in hospital. He's so delerious that he thinks he's falling in love with her, but isn't really going to remember her when he gets out of the hospital. That's a plot point that's going to come up later in the movie.

The action switches to Berlin, where the Germans are giving an award to one of their agents, before informing said agent of her new assignment. That agent is one Fräulein Von Lorbeer, first name Helene, who just happens to be the same Helen that ministered to Bennett in the French field hospital! Helene's assignment is to get on a submarine that's heading for the Irish coast, although Ireland wasn't quite independent at the time, unlike World War II. From there, she'll make her way to Liverpool, while she'll get picked up by an agent Thompson.

Thompson takes her to London, where she is to play the part of a refugee and get herself ingratiated with one Arthur Bennett (Holmes Herbert), who is a new Cabinet minister and as such a ripe target for spying on. As you can guess, Arthur happens to be the father of Frank, who is going to come back home later in the movie and think he might recognize this "refugee".

Helene's contact in the house is one Valdar (Boris Karloff), the valet to Bennett who is also in the employ of the Germans. Valdar isn't overly open about exactly what Helene's duties are going to be. In fact, he suspects her of being too direct in trying to make contact with him. Valdar suspects Helene of possibly being a double agent and in cahoots with the British. But Helene finds that she also has reason to suspect Valdar of being the exact same thing.

Eventually, the Brits cotton on to the fact that the elder Bennett is in danger of being spied upon by the Germans, but they can't figure out who are the Germans in their midst. So they set up a trap and try to catch, well, somebody.

British Intelligence is a movie that has a surprising amount of twists and turns for a B movie. You can see how it got made to try to get American audiences on the side of the British while they were at war and the Americans were still neutral. At the same time, with a pretty brief running time even for a B movie, at a shade over one hour, British Intelligence doesn't get much chance to rise to greatness.

It's a fine example of a B movie, however, and one that mostly works at what it sets out to do, which is fairly modest. So it's definitely worth watching if you get the chance.