The Man Without a Country (1937)

Despite the fact that this starts with “God Save the King” playing under the titles, it’s not actually the Brits whom “Lt. Nolan” (John Litel) is planning on defecting to when he is arrested by the US Army. He’s quite a strong-willed and belligerent gent, though, so rather than just play it cool and keep his head down, he loses the plot at his court martial and ends up being sentenced to something uniquely cruel. He is to spend the rest of his life at sea but he is prohibited from ever visiting his country again and from hearing anything about it from any of the US Navy shipmates. Despite the best efforts of his dedicated fiancée “Marlan” (Gloria Holden) nobody is prepared to intercede for him, not even President Jackson, so it looks like this is how his days will end. It’s probably designed to extol the virtues of being true to the flag, etc. but for me actually proved to be a more potent costume drama about the power of ostracism and alienation from friends and family. Litel’s complexion looks like it was dipped in a bucket of foundation before filming and that had already managed to set before he started to deliver his fairly plastic performance and though it’s another fine example of the costumier’s arts when helped along by Technicolor, it’s really a bit flat.