Torn Curtain
An American scientist publicly defects to East Germany as part of a cloak and dagger mission to find the solution for a formula resin and then figuring out a plan to escape back to the West.
- Director: Alfred Hitchcock
- Genre:Mystery / Thriller
- Runtime:128 minutes
Cast
Paul Newman : Professor Michael Armstrong
Julie Andrews : Sarah Sherman
Lila Kedrova : Countess Kuchinska
Hansjörg Felmy : Heinrich Gerhard (as Hansjoerg Felmy)
Tamara Toumanova: Ballerina
On a cruise ship en route to Copenhagen, Michael Armstrong (Paul Newman), an esteemed American physicist and rocket scientist, is to attend a scientific conference. Once there, he begins acting suspiciously, eventually flying to East Berlin, where he is welcomed by representatives of the East German government. His assistant and fiancée, Sarah Sherman (Julie Andrews), follows him there, believing he has defected to the other side. Sherman, however, is extremely uncomfortable with this move, realizing if the apparent defection is in fact real, given the circumstances of the Cold War of the period, she would likely never see her home or family again. They are constantly accompanied by Professor Karl Manfred (Günter Strack), who took part in arranging Armstrong’s defection to the East.
It soon becomes apparent to the viewer that Armstrong’s defection is in fact a ruse to gain the confidence of the East German scientific establishment, in order to learn just how much their chief scientist Gustav Lindt (Ludwig Donath) and by extension, the Soviet Union knows about anti-missile systems. Armstrong has made preparations to return to the West which are threatened (along with the entire escape network, known as Pi) when he is followed to the home of his contact (on an isolated farm) by Hermann Gromek, an East German security officer (Wolfgang Kieling) assigned to his case. Armstrong kills Gromek, who is then buried, along with Gromek’s motorcycle, by the “farmer” (Mort Mills) and his wife (Carolyn Conwell), but the taxicab driver (Peter Lorre Jr.) who drove Armstrong to the farm reports his suspicions to the police (Volkspolizei). Read more
