Went the Day Well? (1942)
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Released in the US as Forty-Eight Hours, Went the Day Well? is a solidly constructed wartime melodrama. Actually, the film covers 72 hours in the life of the small British village of Bramley Green, which serves as the focal point for an attempted German invasion. Immediately upon parachuting in the community, vicious Nazi officer Ortier (Basil Sydney) makes contact with local Fifth Columnist Oliver Wileford (Leslie Banks), using the film's British title as their password. Fortunately, Democracy is preserved when postmistress-telephone operator Mrs. Collins (Muriel George), picking up on a simple clue inadvertently left behind by the well-disguised Germans, alerts her neighbors of impending danger. The British home guardsmen and German soldiers seen in the film were drawn from the ranks of of the real-life Gloucestershire Regiment, who volunteered their services for this patriotic morale-booster. The episode screenplay of Went the Day Well (based on Graham Greene story) was unified by the direct-to-camera narration of the town gravedigger, a device deftly borrowed from Our Town. ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide
Complete Cast:
- Leslie Banks - Oliver Wilsford
- Frank Lawton - Tom Sturry
- Valerie Taylor - Nora Ashton
- Grace Arnold - Mrs. Owen
- David Farrar - Lieutenant Jung
- C.V. France - Vicar
- Patricia Hayes - Daisy
- Victor Weske - Axed German Soldier
- Thora Hird - Ivy
- Mervyn Johns - Charles Sims
- Norman Pierce - Jim Sturry
- Basil Sydney - Maj. Ortler
- Elizabeth Allan - Peggy
- John Slater - German Sergeant
- Hilda Bayley - Cousin Maud
- Harry Fowler - Young George
- Muriel George - Mrs. Collins
- Johnnie Schofield - Joe Garbett
- Eric Micklewood - Soldier
- Ellis Irving - Harry Drew
- Marie Lohr - Mrs. Frazer
- Edward Rigby - Bill Purvis
- Director(s):
- Alberto Cavalcanti
- Writer(s):
- Diana Morgan, Angus MacPhail, John Dighton
- Producer(s):
- Michael Balcon
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