The Devil Makes Three ** (1952, Gene Kelly, Pier Angeli, Richard Rober, Richard Egan) – Classic Movie Review 10,603

Director Andrew Marton’s 1952 MGM black and white thriller The Devil Makes Three stars Gene Kelly, who enjoys a straight acting role as American pilot Captain Jeff Eliot, a US serviceman who stumbles across a secret Neo-Nazi gang of black marketeers when he goes back to Munich in 1947 after the war to find a family who saved his life during World War Two after his plane was shot down over Munich.

He meets up with Wilhelmina (Willie) Lehrt (Italian star Pier Angeli) as the daughter of the family who had saved him, though her parents died when their house was bombed. She is now working as nightclub hostess and has some very dodgy friends.

It is good to see Kelly flexing his acting muscles, and he was a better actor than given credit for, but the ploddingly developed yarn lets him down. It is one of those films where the locations and location shooting help to add a much needed extra layer of interest. The movie’s end is filmed at the ruins of Adolf Hitler’s Berghof in Obersalzberg, Berchtesgaden, Germany. It is also filmed in the Bavaria-Filmkunst Studios, Munich, Germany.

Jerry Davis’s screenplay is based on the story Autobahn by Lawrence Bachmann.

Also in the cast are Richard Rober and Richard Egan.

© Derek Winnert 2020 Classic Movie Review 10,603

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