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Torrent Description
2015.05.12
 The Battle of the River Plate (1956) Xvid 1cd - War Drama - John Gregson. Anthony Quayle [DDR] The Battle of the River Plate is a 1956 British war film by director-writer team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, starring John Gregson, Anthony Quayle and Peter Finch. In the United States the film was retitled Pursuit of the Graf Spee. The film is about the Battle of the River Plate, a real naval battle of 1939 between a Royal Navy force of three cruisers and the German pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee. CAST:- John Gregson as Captain Frederick "Hookie" Bell, HMS Exeter Anthony Quayle as Commodore Henry Harwood, HMS Ajax Ian Hunter as Captain Charles Woodhouse, HMS Ajax Jack Gwillim as Captain Edward Parry, HMS Achilles Bernard Lee as Captain Patrick Dove, MS Africa Shell Peter Finch as Captain Hans Langsdorff, Admiral Graf Spee Patrick Macnee as Lieutenant Commander Ralph Medley, HMS Ajax Christopher Lee as Manolo, bar owner in Montevideo harbour Directed by Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger Produced by Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger Written by Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger Music by Brian Easdale Running time 119 minutes MOVIE PLOT:- The Battle of the River Plate (1956) In the early months of the Second World War, Nazi Germany's Kriegsmarine sends out merchant raiders to attack Allied shipping. The Royal Navy responds with hunting groups whose mission is to stop them. The group that finds the heavily armed pocket battleship Admiral Graf Spee near South America is outgunned: Graf Spee is equipped with long-range 11-inch guns, while the British heavy cruiser Exeter has much lighter 8-inch guns, and the light cruisers Ajax and Achilles have 6-inch guns. Despite this, they go straight to the attack. The British are led by Commodore Harwood (Anthony Quayle), with Captain Woodhouse (Ian Hunter) commanding flagship Ajax, Captain Bell (John Gregson) Exeter and Captain Parry (Jack Gwillim) Achilles. The British use their superior numbers to "split her fire" by attacking from different directions, but Graf Spee, under Captain Hans Langsdorff (Peter Finch), inflicts much damage on her foes; Exeter is particularly hard hit and is forced to retire. However, Graf Spee sustains damage herself, and takes refuge in the neutral port of Montevideo, Uruguay for repairs. According to international law, the ship may remain at neutral harbour only long enough to make repairs for seaworthiness, not to refit her for battle. With reinforcements too far away, the British spread disinformation that an overwhelming force is lying in wait, hoping to buy time: while they are initially demanding that the Uruguayan authorities send the Admiral Graf Spee out to sea within 24 hours, as the law of the seas dictates, they suddenly lose interest and appear to tolerate the ship staying anchored for as long as she wants. This is a bluff intended to make the Germans believe that British warships are on the way, when none are. Taken in by the lies, Langsdorff takes his ship out with a skeleton crew and scuttles her. HISTORIC DETAILS:- The use of real ships allows the film to pay particular attention to detail (however, the Graf Spee was portrayed by the American heavy cruiser USS Salem (CA-139) which is visually distinct from the German Pocket Battleship), including the bells ringing before each salvo, the scorching on the gun barrels after the battle, and the accurate depiction of naval procedures. However, the scene when Harwood meets with his captains on board Ajax is fictional, created for the movie in order to explain the tactical situation to the audience. The battle is seen entirely from the perspective of the British ships, plus that of prisoners, captured from nine merchantmen, held on Graf Spee. The film devotes nearly twenty minutes to the battle, which actually lasted a little more than an hour before becoming a chase into Montevideo. The initial minutes from the spotting of Graf Spee at 0614, to her opening fire at 0618, and the British ships returning fire from 0620 are depicted in real time. In reality Graf Spee's gunfire did not "straddle" Exeter until 0623, after three salvoes, and her main armament fire was not "split" between the British ships until 0630, although these events are shown happening immediately. Exeter's bridge and forward turrets were knocked out at 0630, but at this point the film begins to telescope the sequence of events. Commodore Harwood is shown wearing the shoulder tabs and sleeve rings of a Rear Admiral from the start, although he was only promoted to this rank after the battle. This is historically correct, as 'Commodores of the first class' wore those insignia at the time. Exeter's chaplain is also correctly depicted wearing a civilian dark suit and clerical collar; it was not until later in the war that naval chaplains adopted military uniform as a security measure. The Battle of the River Plate only hints at one aspect of the story: the death of Captain Hans Langsdorff, who committed suicide a few days after he scuttled his ship. Langsdorff is shown as subdued and depressed afterwards. CAST NOTES:- Future director John Schlesinger has a small part as a prisoner on board the Graf Spee, as does Captain Patrick Dove of Africa Shell, who is himself portrayed by Bernard Lee. Anthony Newley and Donald Moffat have small parts as a radio operator and a lookout. Moffat was making his film debut, as was Jack Gwillim. PODUCTION NOTES:- The Battle of the River Plate had its genesis in an invitation to Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger to attend a film festival in Argentina in 1954. They decided they couldn't afford to take the time from their schedules unless it was a working vacation, and used the trip to research the defeat of the Admiral Graf Spee. They came across the "hook" for their story when one of the surviving British naval officers gave Pressburger a copy of Captain Patrick Dove's book I Was A Prisoner on the Graf Spee, which became the basis of the human story of the film. Powell's work on this film was influenced by Noël Coward's film In Which We Serve (1942) Filming started on 13 December 1955, the sixteenth anniversary of the battle. The HMS Ajax and River Plate Association reportedly sent a message to the producers: "Hope your shooting will be as successful as ours." Location shooting for the arrival and departure of the Graf Spee took place at the port of Montevideo, using thousands of locals as extras. However, the scenes showing Graf Spee sailing from Montevideo were shot in the Grand Harbour at Valletta in Malta, and the launch taking McCall out to HMS Ajax was filmed in Gozo harbour on Malta's northern island.             TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS:- Video Codec: XviD ISO MPEG-4 Video Bitrate: 621 kbps Video Resolution: 640x368 Video Aspect Ratio: 1.739:1 Frames Per Second: 23.976 Audio Codec: 0x2000 (Dolby AC3) AC3 Audio Bitrate: 192kb/s CBR 48000 Hz Audio Streams: 2 Audio Languages: English RunTime 119 mins Subtitles: NONE Ripped by: Trinidad [DDR] 
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