One of the many egregious overwrites of the Motion Picture Academy, is to fail to find even a single slot in the fifty years he has been active for Donald Sutherland as an actor. With over a hundred and twenty five feature film credits, surely there was a performance deserving of acknowledgement. Klute, M*A*s*H, Ordinary People, Don’t Look Now are starring roles that could have earned him that honor. His creepy turns in Backdraft, JFK could also have done the trick. I’m of a mind to add this film to the list of quality work that has been a missed opportunity for his peers to recognize him.
One of the reasons this might have slipped past them is that Sutherland is playing a villain role, and with few exceptions, those roles are suspect. Here he plays Henry Farber a decorated veteran working a communication post for the British at the start of WWII. In reality he is a Nazi spy, planted in England under Hitler’s personal intelligence network. After murdering a civilian he moves on to other missions until before D-Day. He is tasked with evaluating the intelligence about Patron’s Army, and he discovers the elaborate trick the Allies are using to throw the Germans off the invasion plans, the Army and planes are a fake, deployed in a spot to suggest a different location for the allied action. His other means of communication have been cut off and he has to rendezvous with a German submarine to pass on this key intelligence. Sutherland murders his way across the country and in attempting to sail out to meet the sub, get stranded on a small island with a limited community, basically one family and a lighthouse keeper. This is where the meat of the movie is, but it takes an hour to get there. The chase for Farber has been intense, but now Farber, codenamed “The Needle” for his use of a switchblade to kill.
On the island, as he is waiting for a second scheduled rendezvous, he is taken in by the farm family, as a castaway Brit. The part of the performance that would justify some awards is in the romance that Sparks between the spy, and an unwitting wife of the embittered farmer, a crippled flyer, injured on their wedding day four years earlier. Farber presents himself as a little boy lost, full of beguiling charm and cognizant of the unhappiness and neglect the woman suffers from. Kate Nelligan plays Lucy, the isolated woman, who is also mother to a four year old child. Although David, the husband is unhappy, he is not a bad guy, just one drowning in self pity and alcohol. He suspects something is wrong, but can’t put a finger on it. The Needle is drawn to Lucy, he can practically smell her sexual neglect.
For an extended period he and Lucy dance around their attraction. Nelligan is sweet and honest in revealing her situation in conversation. Sutherland uses his own disguised history to relate to her and ingratiate himself with her. Sutherland’s smile can go both ways, it can be charming and warm and cold and calculating, and he uses it well. The sex scenes in the movie are discrete but very alluring. The morning after their first tryst he plays the noble gentleman who tries to dismiss what has happened. He hits just the right amount of guilt to stoke the amorous flames, but he also tells her indirectly that he plans to kill her, passing it off as a story he is writing.
Sutherland is sympathetic to Lucy and polite with David, but he is still a killer and when cornered he is quick to act in a deadly way. The way he jumps between civility and cold blooded murder is what makes the performance so effective. The suspense of the chase and the U-boat hook up plays in the background and this movie feels like an old fashioned film for adults with real people, not super spies and physically superior specimens. Lucy’s desire is passionate and it blinds her at first to what Farber really is. When she discovers what he has done, she has to conceal the knowledge and continue as if this Affair is still real. The Needle pretends to be it he indulgent lover in a two faced manner that is really creepy. Nelligan must perform beautifully to pull of the last act. She discovers what a monster he really is. The climax of the film involves her jeopardy and the outcome of the war.
This nifty spy, romance thriller was directed by Richard Marquand, immediately before he began work on Return of the Jedi. He only directed a half dozen features and this is right in the middle. This was also the final film score of Miklos Rozsa, the Academy Award winning composer of Ben Hur. Ken Follet wrote several successful novels but none other than this one has made it to the big screen. This is also the first screen credit of one of our favorites, Bill Nighy.
My memory is that this is the movie Dee and I saw on our 1st anniversary. We saw it a second time with Kathy and Art a week later because we liked it so well and Art, like me, loved a good spy film.
80s Nostalgia Central: A Kirkham a Movie A Day Project 