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George Seaton connected an ideal cast to this true-life WW2 story so good that a lazy script and slack direction can’t sink it. William Holden is the American-Swede who spies for the Allies, ruining his own reputation and schmoozing with Nazis that will kill him if he slips up. Wonderful Lilli Palmer is the patriot-agent who steals his heart. The locations are impressive but one inspired scene captures with perfection the utter depravity of fascist power. If ever a WW2 movie needed a remake, this one qualifies.

The Counterfeit Traitor

Region-free Blu-ray

Viavision [Imprint] 118

1962 / Color / 1:78 widescreen / 141 min. / Street Date April 27, 2022 / Available from /

Starring: William Holden, Lilli Palmer, Hugh Griffith, Carl Raddatz, Ernst Schröder, Charles Régnier, Ingrid van Bergen, Helo Gutschwager, Wolfgang Preiss, Werner Peters, Erica Beer, Stefan Schnabel, Klaus Kinski, Eva Dahlbeck.

Cinematography: Jean Bourgoin

Production Designer: Ellen Schmidt

Art Directors: Hal Pereira, Tambi Larsen, Mathias Matthies

Film Editors: Hans Ebel,...

Marc Allégret: From André Gide lover to Simone Simon mentor (photo: Marc Allégret) (See previous post: "Simone Simon Remembered: Sex Kitten and Femme Fatale.") Simone Simon became a film star following the international critical and financial success of the 1934 romantic drama Lac aux Dames, directed by her self-appointed mentor – and alleged lover – Marc Allégret.[1] The son of an evangelical missionary, Marc Allégret (born on December 22, 1900, in Basel, Switzerland) was to have become a lawyer. At age 16, his life took a different path as a result of his romantic involvement – and elopement to London – with his mentor and later "adoptive uncle" André Gide (1947 Nobel Prize winner in Literature), more than 30 years his senior and married to Madeleine Rondeaux for more than two decades. In various forms – including a threesome with painter Théo Van Rysselberghe's daughter Elisabeth – the Allégret-Gide relationship remained steady until the late '20s and their trip to...