Conspiracy of Hearts

With Mussolini gone and the Allies pressing northwards into Italy, the Nazis are becoming more desperate to cling onto the territory that was once that of their now largely capitulated allies. It's still a dangerous place for the Jewish people, though, and it falls to "Mother Katherine" (Lilli Palmer) and her courageous sisterhood of nuns to try and use their convent to smuggle out some youngsters from the nearby internment camp to the safety of nearby Palestine. The local military under the command of "Maj. Spoletti" (Ronald Lewis) isn't exactly on the ball when it comes to policing these repatriations, so in comes "Col. Horsten" (Albert Lieven) and his ghastly henchman "Schmidt" (Peter Arne) to restore order. After the death of one of their number, the nuns become a target of the suspicions of their new overloads and things become even more precarious for the sisters. Can they keep the escape route functioning in the face of greater and more brutal scrutiny? This doesn't follow the rose-tinted road that you might expect, and both Palmer and the Lieven delver strongly as this story of inhumanity shows us that their robes offer scant protection from men in uniform who care nothing for anything but obeying their orders. The question is, might the Italian soldiers - a much more God-fearing troop - be prepared to intervene before there is bloodshed? There is one line in this film where a fleeing and terrified young girl is asked her name. She replies "Jew Dog" and that rather sums up the atrocity of their scenario and of the sensitivity of both the writing and the gently effective performances from a supporting cast that includes Sylvia Syms, Yvonne Mitchell and Megs Jenkins as characters who saw no alternative than the path they embarked upon. It's partly a story of faith, yes, but it's also a story of decency and humanity in the face of heinousness and it is certainly one of the better films about WWII.