Conspiracy of Hearts

I saw it when I was 8 years old, I'm almost 40 now and I always remember this movie. Catholic nuns in France, hiding Jewish children in their convent during the occupation. Lilli Palmer, I remember her face vividly. There must be a reason, but I can't find a copy of that film, not even on video. Maybe, I should keep the memory as it is, rather than jeopardizing it by seeing again, today. I couldn't sleep after I saw it. I think I lived that film. It happened to me another time, when I was around the same age. A Spanish movie, MARCELINO PAN Y VINO. Strangely enough, both films have religious roots and take place within the walls of convents and monasteries. I wonder what that means.

Please can this beautiful film regarding Christian suffering and the understanding of standing for principles of truth be re-released on DVD. Even though I am not a Catholic Christian, but of another part of the family of Christ, I attended a Catholic school and I just feel this a really beautiful film.May God Bless all those Christians that risked their lives to save Jews and the weak in Nazi Occupied Europe. I feel these kind of films must be shown to an ignorant generation of people that have forgotten the horrors of World War 2. The wish of those that gave their lives in World War 2 for freedom and peace is that "We don't forget".Even if we look at the World now there is still genocide still taking place against vulnerable people just because they are different or speak different.

I saw this movie as a little girl with my mom. I was too young to understand or appreciate it. I got the opportunity to see it in my twenties and never forgot it. The last time it was shown, I taped it and have never seen it on T. V. again.

The courtyard scene at the end is what I remember most. Other memorable scenes are: the nuns hiding the children at the bottom of the farmer's wheelbarrel while a Nazi officer stabs a pitchfork into it to make sure it is really garbage underneath, the German nun who was angry at hiding the children at the beginning, later winds up saving one of them by hiding her under her habit and the beginning of the film when the nuns asked a little girl her name, and she replies "Jew Dog". She said she had been called that so many times by the Germans that she forgot her real name, and at Yom Kippur when the children read the names of their families who are all dead. This is a wonderful movie. It is a shame it is not available on video or shown on cable.

Lily Palmer as the Mother Superior is outstanding especially noting her beauty.

I first saw this movie in 1960 when I was 10 and was taken to see it with my mother on our weekly Monday night visit to the Cinema. I didn't go out of choice, It was just for me and my mother to get out of my Fathers way so he could get on with jobs about the house. I can't remember many films that I saw at that time but this was one of the few that stuck in my mind. I suppose it was that I could identify with the Children as they were about my age and that it was about the war. Those of us born in the 40's and 50's grew up with stories about the war. It was certainly a topic for discussion I'm our household as my Father had been a radio operator in the RAF from 1939 onwards.

I can remember being deeply moved and disturbed by it even at that young age especially at the climatic ending. Since then I have seen it on TV as it occasionally pops up on UK TV often in the afternoons. The last time it appeared about 18 months ago I took the opportunity to record it on Video. I watch it when I need to renew my faith in mankind as it proves that even in the darkest times, there are people who will risk all for others and their beliefs and that goodness eventually triumphs over evil.

I first saw this film at the Mile End Odeon in East London when I was a kid. I was with a couple of friends and we thought that this film would be just another British war film. However, Mile End in those days still had a reasonably large Jewish population and older people all around us kids were openly weeping throughout the showing of the film. Later, in the foyer a woman told us that her family had been killed during the Hollocaust. A saw this film again quite recently on television and it really is quite a remarkable film. The characters have real depth and the the story about nuns sheltering Jewish children from the Nazis in Italy during World War II is not sentimentalised. The sub-plot concerning an unrequited love story between an Italian officer and a novice nun is is really well presented and does not intrude on the main story concerning Nazi ruthlessness and brutality towards the Jewish children and the nuns.