Highly Overrated But Still Good

Great Film overall

The film makes a home in your brain and the only cure is to see it again.

At first rather annoying in its heavy emphasis on reenactments, this movie ultimately proves fascinating, simply because the complicated, highly dramatic tale it tells still almost defies belief.

Based on the 1950 book of the same name by W. Stanley Moss, this is quite an entertaining war adventure film but it could have been a great deal better. It tells the story of the kidnapping of General Heinrich Kriepe, the commander of the German occupation force on Crete, by Moss, his Special Operations Executive (SOE) colleague Major Patrick Leigh Fermor and the Cretan resistance in April 1944. However, it approaches the material with a light touch, incorporating quite a bit of humour and often seeming like a "Boy's Own" adventure. I don't have any problem with this approach but it is not executed as well as I would have liked. The film was released under the rather more obvious title "Night Ambush" in the United States.The script by Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger is fairly good but there are a few structural problems. It was a mistake for the kidnapping to occur comparatively early in the film as the planning stages could have been much more interesting and it sometimes feels as if it has nowhere to go after that. The depiction of the kidnapping itself was apparently accurate but it was not depicted in a very exciting manner. After that, there is not much of a sense of suspense or tension as the two British officers and the Cretans evade the Nazi patrols comparatively easily. However, I did like the fact that there was a sense of mutual respect and admiration between the British and German forces, something which Powell and Pressburger explored in more depth in "The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp". While the writing is not up to their usual high standard, the duo's direction is as deft as ever. The film looks beautiful and it makes great use of the beautiful scenery of the south of France. Unfortunately, this was the final film that they made together under their production company, the Archers, but they later collaborated on "They're a Weird Mob" in 1966 and "The Boy Who Turned Yellow" in 1972.The film stars Dirk Bogarde in a characteristically excellent performance as Leigh Fermor, a colourful gentleman adventurer and scholar soldier of the old mould. Known as "Philedem" to the Greeks, he played a major role in helping to organise the Cretan resistance during the war. Bogarde brings all of the considerable charm and charisma at his disposal but Leigh Fermor was seemingly a larger than life figure and there are, at best, only a few hints of that in the script. Powell and Pressburger regular Marius Goring is very good as the honourable General Kriepe but I would have still preferred if their original choice Curd Jürgens had been cast instead. That said, Bogarde and Goring have good chemistry. Plus, their slight resemblance makes it easier to buy that Leigh Farmer could be mistaken for Kriepe in the dark than it would have been if the far larger Jürgens had been cast. David Oxley, probably best known for playing the small role of Sir Hugo Baskerville in "The Hound of the Baskervilles" (1959), is fairly dull and forgettable as Moss. In contrast to Bogarde, he is mostly charisma free. Cyril Cusack is great as Captain Sandy Rendel, who was not washed for six months and has the pungent smell to prove it. Wolfe Morris, Michael Gough and Laurence Payne are very good as Leigh Farmer and Moss' Cretan allies George, Manoli and Andoni Zoidakis respectively, even though Gough's Greek accent is practically non-existent. The film also features nice small appearances from former SOE operative Christopher Lee and Richard Marner (both of whom got to make use of their fluent German), George Pravda and an uncredited David McCallum in his film debut.Overall, this is a fun film belonging to the "men on a mission" World War II subgenre but I would have liked it if the Archers had bowed out on a stronger film.

"Night Ambush" qualifies as a minor but factual account about the April 1944 abduction of a high-ranking German general by the British with the aid of Crete resistance fighters. The writer & director combo Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, who made "One of Our Aircraft is Missing," based their screenplay on the 1952 book "Ill Met by Moonlight: The Abduction of General Kreipe" by W. Stanley Moss. British officer Major Patrick Leigh Fermor (Dirk Bogarde of "The Servant") steal ashore after dark and help the resistance capture Kreipe (Marius Goring of "The Red Shoes") and take him on a grueling journey into the mountains across Crete to a rendezvous with a British warship while the Germans scour the terrain in search of their commanding officer who was the top officer on the island of Crete. Ostensibly, there is not much combat action in this thriller about stealth, but the scenery looks spectacular. Michael Gough, who later gained fame as the butler in the Michael Keaton "Batman" movie makes an appearance as Andoni Zoidakis, while future "Dracula" Christopher Lee plays a German soldier. Competently made drama boasts its share of twists and turns in the narrative as our heroes toil on foot to meet the British destroyer that will transport Kreipe to Cairo for questioning. When everything is said and done, General Kreipe salutes Fermor and congratulates him for his daring escapade. The mutual respect and admiration between the British and the Germans was a theme that recurred throughout the war films of Powell and Pressburger. British cinematographer Christopher Challis lensed this atmospheric wartime thriller in black & white. Challis shot the World War II thriller The Battle of the River Plate (1956) for Powell and Pressburger, and the film was later retitled as "Pursuit of the Graf Spee.

Filmed ten years AFTER the end of the second world war, Night Ambush (ILL MET BY MOONLIGHT to the rest of the world) is a story of British operatives in Crete, reporting home on the activities of the Germans. Their plan is to grab a German officer and take him away. The only name I recognized here is British actor Dirk Bogarde, who plays Major Patrick Fermor. In this story, David Oxley plays Captain I.W. Stanley Moss; Moss is also the original author of his own true account of this WWII story, according to Wikipedia. Part of the story is kind of a jolly old adventure, with dancing and singing, which was a little odd for spies keeping a low profile. Take note of the German officer who barges in at the dentist's office to inspect everyone's papers; Christopher Lee (would have been about 30) has played many roles, frequently the villain in Star Wars, Man with the Golden Gun, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, and even Sherlock Holmes. Interesting career,he has worked with many of the greats. As others have mentioned, incredible outdoor photography, which seems to be the Italian Alps. Quite good quality sound and photography by the Rank Organisation, for the 1950s. Screenplay and direction by Powell and Pressburger, who had made 25 films together. Good way to spend 104 minutes (although IMDb shows "US version 93 mins", Turner Classics DID show the 104 min version ....there were a couple off- color remarks, but certainly not 10 minutes worth.) Doesn't seem to have won any awards, but interesting spy story from WW II.

even allowing for the fact that Ican take or leave Powell and Pressburger either as a team or working individually this is still pretty ho hum. It's not just that it's yet another true-life adventure torn from the annals of World War II - and boy, were they glad to get rid of it - it's more that it's exciting or engrossing enough to stand out from the others; it's not even that apart from Bogard and a badly miscast Cyril Cusack the only British actors involved are definitely minor league in the shape of Michael Gough and Wolf Morris, it's more that no two actors - and that includes Marius Goring - are able to give the impression that they are in the same film or often in the same scene. All in all it's something of an unintentional Greek tragedy.