Hanover Street (1979)

Overrated and overhyped

Funny, strange, confrontational and subversive, this is one of the most interesting experiences you'll have at the cinema this year.

The story-telling is good with flashbacks.The film is both funny and heartbreaking. You smile in a scene and get a soulcrushing revelation in the next.

This film is so real. It treats its characters with so much care and sensitivity.

Everyone else has already covered most of the pros and cons of this film. I thought it was great. I bought it for the flying sequences and everything else was a plus. Lesley-Ann Down was perfect casting, although, I could see Glynis Johns or Jenny Agutter equally perfect, if they had been chosen; if they had auditioned. Patsy Kensit was just as perfect as a ten year old Sarah, and I could imagine Emma Watson in the part, had she not just been born when the film was released. Patsy, of course, was Mel Gibsons romantic interest in Lethal Weapon II. The director/writers commentary from Peter Hyams, is filled will interesting background, about this one, and film making in general. Here are my Five Stars!~!~~!

Hanover Street is one of those old fashioned wartime romances so popular on both sides of the pond during and after World War II. At a time when a lot of people and nations united to defeat a generally recognized menace to civilization folks were in a sacrificing mood.American flier Harrison Ford and British army nurse Lesley Anne Down meet on Hanover Street and the chemistry is high voltage electric. Soon they are in an affair, but Down doesn't tell Ford she's already slightly married to Christopher Plummer.Plummer is in British Intelligence, a researcher and a trainer, but yearns for some field action feeling that Down might see him in a better life as he has suspicions that she's drifting away. Wouldn't you know it he takes on a field mission that involves him pretending to be an S.S. officer and he's to go to some S.S. headquarters in occupied France and steal some vital plans. This is the kind of plot that was popular during World War II years. The most famous were those sought after 'letters of transit' in Casablanca.That field mission puts him on Harrison Ford's bomber and when it's hit both have to bail out and Ford becomes part of the mission.Hanover Street is so old fashioned though Ford seems to borrow a bit of Han Solo from the future in his portrayal of the flier that it really belongs in the Forties. Only that Ford and Down are actually shown if discreetly having a sexual relationship that the Code would never permit you would swear this was a Forties film. In fact think Casablanca if want to know how this ends.If you like romances, Hanover Street is for you.

I don't understand all of the negative comments about this movie. Whist by no mean is it a perfect movie, it is not a bad one and is more than watchable. Which can not be said of a lot of movies these days.Lesley-Anne Down is Margaret a Nurse who meets and falls in love with an American pilot (Harrison Ford) in England during World War 2, she is however married to a secret agent (Christopher Plummer) who ends up on a mission with Ford.This movie tells the story of what war is like for lovers, soldiers, and ordinary civilians caught up in it.Back in the pilots seat Ford is as reliable as you'd expect him to be at that time, Down, whilst looking very attractive gives an OK performance, but it's hard to feel any sympathy for her situation, as she is simply bored in her marriage to Plummer (who is as solid as you'd expect) and lusts after Ford. Ford's character for his part doesn't know she is married, and her trusting husband, does not suspect a thing. The rest of the cast is fine Richard Masur is a stand out performer and Kudos to a young Patsy Kensit as Down and Plummer's daughter. Shane Rimmer is also worthy of note as Ford's Colonel. John Barry's score is lovely and reminds me of his work in Somewhere In Time.The movie was sadly a critical and commercial flop upon release (despite Ford still being hot from 'Star Wars') which is a shame, as it is a much better movie than Pearl Harbour released a few years ago, which is more or less the same story but with a lot of CGI replacing genuine tension and not nearly as good performances.Everyone involved quickly moved on to other projects. Hyams directed the Sean Connery space thriller 'Outland' Barry composed the music for the next Bond flick 'Moonraker', Plummer starred opposite Christopher Reeve and Jane Seymour in Somewhere In Time, Down starred opposite an in his prime Burt Reynolds and David Niven in the crime caper 'Rough Cut' and Ford, well he went off and made Empire Strikes Back and a little known picture by the name of Raiders Of The Lost Ark.

It can't have been easy to have a cast of charming highly competent actors,charismatic warplanes,a bitter - sweet romance in war - ravaged picturesque London and turn the whole lot into a turkey of a movie but Mr.P.Hyams managed it in "Hanover Square". He wasn't helped by a script that may have passed muster at the Odeon, Streatham in 1942 for a less than critical audience never sure that their house would still be standing by the time the movie was finished,but more peaceful and plentiful times were rather more demanding. Mr C.Plummer plays the upper middle class Intelligence Officer whose wife (Miss L.A.Downs) has an affair with USAF officer(Mr H.Ford). Apparently Mr Ford is so irresistible to Miss Downs that they have sex in a conveniently situated country hotel on their first date,an event so unlikely as to be almost incredible.Yes I know it's wartime,and I know things were different,but believe me nicely brought up English gels with husbands and daughters most definitely did not "put out" as our American friends would say on their first illicit meeting with a virtual stranger,even if he is an intrepid birdman. Indeed Miss Downs is so irredeemably posh that I am not entirely convinced that Mr Ford does not classify as her bit of rough. She is a voluntary nurse - albeit one with an immaculate uniform and beautifully - coiffed hair.She walks the wards as a Lady Bountiful and I'm almost convinced the Sister refers to her as "Lady Margaret" at one stage. Her husband is in some "hush - hush" department running secret agents and they live in a very upmarket Townhouse somewhere around the Harley Street triangle.Their daughter (little Miss P.Kensit) is a cute poppet and everything in the marital garden appears lovely.Why she should risk all this for a quick tumble with a not particularly winning American bomber pilot is not clear.It certainly isn't for his conversation ,his monotonous tone of voice or his sense of humour. By contrast Mr C.Plummer is gentle,articulate and sensitive. In a ridiculously contrived plot twist he and Mr Ford end up in occupied France wearing German uniforms on a Deadly Mission. On their return Mr Ford nobly lets Miss Downs go back to her husband and is last seen loping across Hanover Square doubtless in pursuit of a fresh conquest. Women with husbands at the front in 1942 would not have been sympathetic towards her,the word "Jezebel" might well have been bandied freely about They knew all about temptation and resolutely resisted it if only for the sake of their men in foreign climes.The thought of a posh woman with a husband at home having it off with a Yank would have filled them with scorn.And quite rightly too. As for that young pilot.....well,he could probably hardly have believed his luck.