The North Star

1943
Approved
1h 48m

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Dana Andrews and Anne Baxter in The North Star (1943)

A Ukrainian village must suddenly contend with the German invasion of June 1941.A Ukrainian village must suddenly contend with the German invasion of June 1941.A Ukrainian village must suddenly contend with the German invasion of June 1941.

See production info at IMDbPro

IMDb RATING

5.9/10

1.8K

YOUR RATING

See production info at IMDbPro

Nominated for 6 Oscars
- 6 nominations total

Goofs
In the opening moments of the film, Damian slides out from under a tractor that has rubber tires. Moments later the tractor is shown as having only steel wheels and no rubber tires.

Quotes
Dr. von Harden: [while Dr. Kurin is holding a gun on Richter and von Harden] I do not like much of what I've done for the past nine years.
Dr. Pavel Grigorich Kurin: [after von Harden has given a blood transfusion from a Russian child to a German soldier] You do not like bleeding children?
Dr. von Harden: Did the boy die?
Dr. Pavel Grigorich Kurin: [Contemtuously] You knew he would die!
Dr. von Harden: They took too much blood. I'm sorry for that.
Dr. Pavel Grigorich Kurin: Yes, I nelieve you when you say you are sorry.
Dr. von Harden: I'm sorry for many things, Dr. Kurin. Most of all that this is not the world we used to know.
Dr. Pavel Grigorich Kurin: I've heard about you... civilized men who are sorry. This...
[Contemptuously gesturing toward Richter]
Dr. Pavel Grigorich Kurin: This kind is nothing! They will go when their bosses go, but men like you who have contempt for men like him! To me you are the real filth... men who do the work of Facists while they pretend to themselves that they are better than the beasts for whom they work... men who do murder while they laugh at them who order them to do it. It is men like you who have sold their people to men like him.
[He points to Richter and shoots him at point blank range]
Dr. Pavel Grigorich Kurin: You see, Dr. von Harden, you were wrong about many things. I AM a man who kills!
[He shoots von Harden at point blank range too]

Alternate versions
In 1956, the film was sold to television and re-edited under the title "Armored Attack." 25 minutes were removed, including all references to the word "comrade," and with the help of voice-over narrations, turned the alleged pro-Communist piece into anti-Communist territory.

Connections
Featured in Sprockets: Masters of Menace (1995)

Soundtracks
Song of the Fatherland
(uncredited)
Music by Aaron Copland
Lyrics by Ira Gershwin

User reviews58

Review

Featured review

6/10

Well made Hollywood propaganda

The North Star is at least as good a propaganda movie as much of Hollywood's wartime output and the astonishing range of talent that helped in its making makes it important rather than brilliant. While not impossible, it would be difficult for this collection of top drawer movie makers to devise a real dog of a production and even the most rabid anti-commie could not put this movie into the same bag as say 'Hitler, Dead of Alive' or 'The menace of the rising sun'. The North Star was multi Oscar nominated and even factoring in the mores of the period, this cannot be dismissed entirely.

Reading the posts on the movie here, it appears to me that some commentators really miss the whole point of US propaganda at the time and condemn The North Star out of context. These responses suggest to me that The North Star's punch has lost none of its original power.