Oscar Movies: Lifeboat–Hitchcock’s WWII Melodrama

Hitchcock directed this WWII melodrama, which approached the war from a different angle. An experimental film due to the fact that the entire action is confined to a small lifeboat adrift on the Atlantic with a handful of survivors from a torpedoed freighter.

Among them was the captain of the attacking U-boat, which was also sunk during the engagement. The oddly assorted group of castaways represented a cross-section of Allied nationalities and points of view as well as personality types, including a self-centered lady journalist (Tallulah Bankhead), a bewildered nurse (Mary Anderson), a shy radio operator (Hume Cronyn), a tough crew member of Czech ancestry (John Hodiak), a shipping magnate (Henry Hull), a crazed mother (Heather Angel) and her dead baby, a black steward (Canada Lee), and a wounded crewman (William Bendix).

The tale was meant to be microcosm of the war. The character of the Nazi U-boat captain, excellently acted by Walter Slezak, provided the most startling and controversial aspect of the picture. The Nazi was portrayed as the only stable, level-headed and practical member of the group. He was the only one among them who had a plan for survival amid the confusion and self-pity that marked his lifeboat companions.

This was a disturbing factor for some critics alarmed at the implications. Hitchcock, however, said that he made the Nazi a strong character in order to indicate that the Nazis should not be underestimated by the Allies.

Lifeboat was a box-office success in New York City, but not elsewhere. Hitchcock received an Academy Award nomination for best Director and Tallulah Bankhead won the New York Film Critics’ Best Actress award.

Cameo:

Hitchcock found an original way to appear in the film, in a newspaper ad on the lifeboat shown before and after the story