22: The Mortal Storm

         I can’t understand why it took me so long to find The Mortal Storm (1940).  It showed recently on Turner Classic Movies, and I was thankful to view it there.  As a Margaret Sullivan/James Stewart vehicle one would think it would be readily available from rental services such as Netflix.com.  Perhaps the buyers for such companies felt that one Sullivan/Stewart film from that year was enough, and settled for The Shop around the Corner (also 1940).  What a pity.  While I can’t definitively say that this film is better than that one, both certainly warrant easy accessibility.  As fantastic examples of studio-era filmmaking before U.S. involvement in WWII, these films represent the range that was required of the performers of the day. 

            The Shop around the Corner is a light but engaging romantic comedy in which Stewart plays the plainspoken charmer that he’s become in all of our minds.  He and Sullivan light up the screen in a scenario that has since been rehashed numerous times, but has never been bested.  In The Mortal Storm, released five months later, the two again play lovers, but this time against the more serious backdrop of the fascist takeover of Germany.  One of the few films released prior to the U.S. entering WWII that took a direct stand against Nazism, The Mortal Storm prompted Hitler to ban the screening of the movie and all subsequent MGM productions in occupied Europe.  According to one story this response was predicted by the German ambassador to the U.S., who urged Louis B. Mayer to reconsider releasing the film.  Upon viewing, it’s clear that simply reediting the picture for European release would have been impossible, as critiques of Nazi symbols and “Heil Hitler” salutes are plainly employed throughout.

            The film opens on the day of Hitler’s election to the chancellorship, an event that polarizes attitudes at the birthday party of a well-respected professor (Frank Morgan) of science who teaches “in a small university town at the base of the Alps.”  While many of the young family members and friends of the professor are enthusiastic about the rise of National Socialism, the professor himself, along with his wife, daughter Freya (Sullivan), and a student, Martin (Stewart), are hesitant to embrace the forthcoming changes.  As months pass, Martin becomes increasingly isolated from the professor and his family, particularly his sons Otto (Robert Stack) and Erich (William T. Orr) who have joined the Nazi Party.  He’s convinced one evening by Freya to join them for drinks, but is disgusted when he sees another of his former teachers being harassed for “non-Arian” behavior.  In this, the film’s most powerful scene, Martin and Freya slouch, bewildered, as their friends and siblings stand at attention and sing out their loyalty to the Third Reich.           

            Martin’s opposition to the state of Germany’s national politics makes him an outcast, and each attempt he makes to meet with Freya, who is still living with her swastika-clad brothers, becomes more and more dangerous.  Nevertheless, their relationship blossoms after her break-up with a fiancé whose position in the party is compromised by her own political dissent.  As forces continue to mount against the professor and the ideas he holds which contradict the tenets of the Final Solution, it becomes clear that escape from Germany is necessary for not only his safety, but for Freya’s and Martin’s as well.  The film’s final half hour is both exciting and moving, and as the picture closes Robert Stack breaks free of the confines of his role for a last moment of poignancy.  The script, well adapted from Phyllis Bottome’s novel, deserves ample credit for most of the movie’s finer moments, but the work of Sullivan and Stewart, as well as the strong supporting cast of Stack, Morgan, and Maria Ouspenskaya as Martin’s mother, drives the point home.  

Since the film’s release, contradicting stories have posited that un-credited producer Victor Saville actually directed much of the final product, but subscribers to the auteur theory place the film nicely in the canon of credited skipper Frank Borzage.  While such stories often run rampant about studio films of the era, there is one truth that cannot be denied regarding The Mortal Storm.  The film should be held in higher esteem, and not relegated to second class status in the Stewart collection.  While it certainly isn’t his best work, it serves as a reminder that he was a solid performer who brought depth to almost every role, not just the characters for whom is so often remembered.  The Film should at least be easily available for online rental, but like so many good films of the studio era it remains at arm’s length for the millennial generation.

Language: English

Runtime: 110 Minutes

Grade: 3 Hats Off