Les Maudits (aka The Damned) (1947)

In 1945 Oslo, just before the fall of Berlin, a group of Nazis and Nazi sympathizers board a submarine headed for South America where they plan to continue to carry on the work of the Third Reich. But the voyage will not be as smooth as anticipated, indeed, to steal the title of another film (from 1976), this is a voyage of the damned. Rene Clement's post-war thriller has been compared to Wolfgang Petersen's DAS BOOT but I don't think it's a fair comparison. They're both films about Nazis in a submarine but that's about it. Clement's film isn't favorably disposed to the Nazis as its 1981 counterpart is ("they're just like you and me"). Clement captures the claustrophobia and the tension of disparate characters, who don't always see eye to eye, crammed into a confined space with no escape. Clement's film allows multi dimensional characters rather than stock stereotypes and some suggestive situations that would never have been allowed in an American film of that time. Technically, it's impressive especially a shot that follows Henri Vidal (as a kidnapped French doctor) the length of the submarine without a cut. it was shot by Henri Alekan (WINGS OF DESIRE) and the effective score is by Yves Baudrier. The cast is very good. In addition to Vidal; there's Marcel Dalio, Jo Dest, Michel Auclair, Fosco Giachetti, Anne Campion, Paul Bernard and Florence Marly.