The Man Between

Very much in the vein of Carol Reed's similar cold war thriller "The Third Man" (1949), this is a gritty and characterful story set in Berlin just before the Soviet Union imposed travel restrictions. ... Very much in the vein of Carol Reed's similar cold war thriller "The Third Man" (1949), this is a gritty and characterful story set in Berlin just before the Soviet Union imposed travel restrictions. This time, the Communists kidnap "Susanne" (Claire Bloom) - she happens to be the sister of British officer "Martin" (Geoffrey Toone) and we are now presented with an intriguing and internecine series of spy and counter-spy scenarios that revolve around the dubious "Ivo" (James Mason) with whom the missing woman had been associating with - and has fallen for. It transpires that she is being held so that they can use her as leverage for the return of "Kastner" (Ernst Schröder), a lawyer with a distinctly dodgy pre-war past. It now falls to "Ivo" to rescue her and smuggle her to safety. Desmond Dickinson's dark and eery photography - especially in what's left of the heavily bombed out Berlin - coupled with a seedy and effective John Addison score work well to create an atmospheric environment. I didn't love Mason's rather unreliable German accent, but Bloom is quite effective and there are compensating and strong supporting contributions from an on-form Hildegard Knef ("Bettina") and from Aribert Wäscher as the untrustworthy "Halendar" as the plot twists and turns towards quite a menacing and tightly shot denouement. The narrative is tight, the romance sparing, it is frequently quite compelling to watch and it does have a ring of plausibility to it. A superior crime drama well worth a watch.