In the days before football & cricket completely took over my life. I used to love watching the afternoon film. With cold rain crashing down outside and a warm fire inside, I'd lie on the floor and just disappear into the screen.
In 'The Heroes of Telemark', the Norwegian resistance sabotage the Vemork Norsk Hydro plant in the town of Rjukan in the county of Telemark, Norway, which the Nazis are using to produce heavy water to make a nuclear bomb.
Kirk Douglas plays Rolf Pedersen, a Norwegian physics professor, who, though originally content to wait out the war, is soon pulled into the struggle by local resistance leader Knut Straud (based on Knut Haukelid, portrayed by Richard Harris).
They are both smuggled to England to have microfilmed plans of the Hydro examined, and then return to Norway to plan a commando raid on the Hydro. When a force of Royal Engineers, who were to carry it out, are all killed, Petersen and Straud lead a small force of saboteurs into the plant. The raid is successful, but them cursed Germans quickly repair the equipment!
The Nazis then plan to ship tankers of heavy water to Germany. Petersen and Straud sabotage a ferry carrying the tankers, and it sinks in the deepest part of a fjord - Hurrah!
The skiing clips are the thing I remember most. I don't hink I'd ever seen it on film before and despite the fact they didn't use the formal Telemark style (as I subsequently found out when I travelled to Norway and actually learnt how to ski!) it still looked effortlessly cool to me.
No comments:
Post a Comment