Cinema
Red Meadows
De røde enge
Bodil Ipsen · 1945
Synopsis
Behind the walls of a prison, the young resistance fighter Michael Lans waits and remembers the events that delivered him to the Gestapo. In a field in Jutland, he and his comrades watched for the Allied planes that were to parachute weapons; he led a group of saboteurs with ambitious plans, despite the fears of his companion Ruth. As long as the comrades stayed united, the group held; then he discovers that an informer has slipped in among them, and the arrests begin.
Context
The film adapts the first novel by Ole Juul, himself a resistance fighter, published in 1945, from a screenplay by Leck Fischer; it was made for the company ASA with Poul Reichhardt in the role of Michael and Lisbeth Movin, who had just married the co-director Lau Lauritzen junior, as Ruth. It was released on 26 December 1945, the same year as another Danish film on the resistance. The director's husband, the journalist Ejnar Black, had had to flee to Sweden because of his resistance activities.
Who it is for
About one hour twenty-five minutes, in Danish, in the form of a prisoner's memories. The film, almost documentary in places, shows scenes of Gestapo brutality.
Prizes and reception
Grand Prix at the first post-war Cannes festival, in 1946, awarded to the two co-directors; regarded as a key work on the Danish resistance.