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Carve Her Name with Pride
1958 Drama / War
Review
Carve Her Name with Pride was
a valiant attempt to apply the social realist style that had become
prevalent in British cinema from the mid-1950s to a conventional
wartime melodrama. The results are not entirely successful – the
story is predictable, the pace is uneven and the sparse action
sequences appear half-hearted and lacking in tension. With
its stiff-upper-lip portrayal of heroism, the film occasionally has the
feel of an old wartime propaganda piece. What saves it is a
captivating performance from Virginia McKenna who, in one of her
career-defining roles, paints a potent portrait of courage and resolve
by conveying the ordinariness of the character she plays. It is
McKenna who gives the film its appeal and stark emotional power. The film is a faithful adaptation of R.J. Minney’s novel of the same title which recounts the wartime exploits of Violette Szabo. The cryptographer and writer Leo Marks collaborated on the screenplay and allowed his well-known poem The life that I have is all that I have to be used. In addition to McKenna, the film features several well-known British actors of the period, notably Paul Scofield and Jack Warner (better known to British TV audiences at the time as Dixon of Dock Green), and French cinema star Maurice Ronet. Lewis Gilbert directed the film, after having recently made another inspirational wartime drama, Reach for the Sky (1956). Although Gilbert is best remembered for his uncompromising, documentary-style dramas, he is also known as the man who directed three of the most lavish James Bond movies, including The Spy Who Loved Me (1977). Watch out for Michael Caine in a small uncredited role – he would subsequently play the lead in Lewis Gilbert’s classic Alfie (1966). © CinemaForever.com 2009 Write a review for this film...User Comments
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Director:
Lewis Gilbert
Starring: Virginia McKenna, Paul Scofield, Jack Warner, Denise Grey, Alain Saury Synopsis
London, 1940. On the pretext of celebrating Bastille Day with a
Frenchman, Violet Bushell accosts Etienne Szabo, an officer in the
French Foreign Legion, and invites him back to her home for
dinner. Within a few days, they have fallen in love and decide to
marry. Three years later, Etienne is dead, killed in action at El
Alamein, but Violet is consoled by the fact that he gave her a
beautiful daughter. A few months later, Violet is contacted by
British Intelligence and persuaded to work as a spy. Her first
mission is to liaise with a resistance group in Rouen and report back
on how many members of the group are still in operation. Her work
done, Violet returns to England and intends to stay there to bring up
her daughter. But then she is offered a second mission, far more
dangerous than the first, and she knows that her wartime adventure is
far from over...
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© CinemaForever.com 2009