The Tenth Man

I remembered this movie (and subsequently ordered it) because of Anthony Hopkins' incredible role. When I received it from my movie retailer, I realized that the other actor in it was Derek Jacobi, who has become my favorite actor of all time. To top it off, the woman is Kristin Scott-Thomas who hadn't come into her own yet. This is an amazing cast, from a novel from an amazing author. Watch it! Watch it!

In the late 1980s, I had just seen Anthony Hopkins in "The Bounty," which together with the earlier "Magic" convinced me he was an actor to watch for; and I had read Graham Greene's recently unearthed little novel "The Tenth Man," when I heard about this TV adaptation. My excited anticipation was not disappointed, and since then I have probably seen this little gem 25 times, often screening it for high school students, who watch in rapt fascination. The plot is amazing -- as only GG could concoct -- and I am still convinced this is Hopkins's best performance. Also superb are Kristin Scott Thomas, Derek Jacobi, Cyril Cusack and Brenda Bruce. Production values are strong if not stellar (after all, it's made for TV). Too bad this film is all but unavailable -- you'll have to buy a used VHS online if you want to see it; but you won't be sorry.

When the Germans invade northern France, they round up a hundred local men, including Anthony Hopkins. Being Nazis and all, they announce that ten of the prisoners will die, and leave it up to them to decide who. They decide on lots. Hopkins is one of the ten. He trades his lot with Timothy Watson, in return for all his goods. Watson leaves everything to his sister and mother.

Three years later, a bearded Hopkins is free and goes to his estate, where Kristen Scott Thomas and an ailing Brenda Bruce are in possession. They wait with fear and hatred Hopkins' return, so he claims to be a nobody and gets a job with them as a common laborer. Then one day,collaborator and fugitive Derek Jacobi, the son of one of the other men in the hundred, shows up, fleeing from the Resistance. He claims to be Anthony Hopkins.

It's based on a novel by Graham Greene that he turned into a script and left in the MGM archives in the mid-1940s. Director Jack Gold handles the film like it's a TV movie with enough of a budget for some extra location shooting. Hopkins plays his role in a repressed combination of shame for what he has done, love for Miss Thomas, and fear for the consequences of any revelation. With a better director, or a better lighting cameraman, the role might have worked. As it is, those who are familiar with Greene's world will understand what is going on. Those who approach it without any background will just find it bizarre.

A WWII dark story by Graham Greene (who also wrote the Third Man).

A prisoner makes a deal with another prisoner to save himself from being executed they swap places in exchange for everything the one owns including a secluded mansion.

I won't spoil the story or bore you (if you have seen it) with more of the plot.

It is well done...the acting good...the screen adaptation of the book not ponderous like they sometimes are trying to cram too much in.

Anthony Hopkins like Anthony Perkins before him was type caste by one horror role. This younger version of him makes it easier to forget.

A good watch. RECOMMEND.

In Nazi-occupied France, a well-to-do businessman is imprisoned by chance and trades all his money and possessions to another prisoner in order to escape execution. Once released, he travels back to his old home and there encounters the bitter family of the man who took his place...

It's a good distance from the perfection of The Third Man, but this largely-forgotten TV adaptation is still a thoroughly engrossing story, much better than the great majority of cinema releases in a similar vein. It's better early on, and ends a little weakly, but all the turns of the plot keep you watching.

Anthony Hopkins is truly first rate, and the script is fine, even if the camerawork, music, direction and general production values are strictly from a 1980s made-for-TV movie. All the other actors are solid, although the young Kristin Scott-Thomas, not yet fully-formed, is slightly miscast as a working class woman with a continually appearing and disappearing amateur dramatics cockerney accent.

With more money, time and care, this could have been just as much a classic as The Remains of The Day or The English Patient, but even as it is, it still remains one of the better adaptations of Greene's work.