'It tells the exciting story of an elderly Czech scientist, who with his daughter is being forced to remain in occupied Czechoslovakia in order to work for the Nazi war machine. With the help of a young Australian they manage to escape to Australia where the professor resumes his experiments. In the meantime the German War Office has despatched a Gestapo officer to travel to Australia and bring the scientist back to Germany, by force.'
Source:
'The Power and the Glory', Singleton Argus, 22 September 1941, p.2.
Note on authorship:
Contemporary newspaper reports indicate both that Monkman collaborated on the film script for The Power and the Glory and that the work was adapted from a story called 'The Man without a Country'. For example, the Mercury (15 November 1941, p.5) notes:
Monkman wrote 'The Power and the Glory' as a story under the title of "Man Without a Country." He prepared the scenario In collaboration with Harry Lauder 2nd, and directed the film.
It is unclear whether newspapers are using 'story' to refer to a short story or to a film treatment, but no published short story by Monkman has so far been traced.
'War films are not an obvious starting point to discuss Australia's diasporic cinema. Nevertheless, portrayals of the enemy draw attention to the nationalizing discourses which serve to maintain an assimilationist model of the nation. While neither German nor Turkish identities figure prominently in Australia's contemporary multicultural cinema, these national 'types' play a more significant role in Australian visual culture produced in the first part of the twentieth century. German, and to a lesser extent Turkish, villains feature in numerous films produced in Australia during both world wars. In this chapter, we argue that in the short term Australian film portrayals of the 'the cruel Hun' and 'noble Turk' encouraged glorification of soldiers in Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC), while in the long term these perpetuated a more nationalistic construction of the Anzac legend' (Publication abstract)
'War films are not an obvious starting point to discuss Australia's diasporic cinema. Nevertheless, portrayals of the enemy draw attention to the nationalizing discourses which serve to maintain an assimilationist model of the nation. While neither German nor Turkish identities figure prominently in Australia's contemporary multicultural cinema, these national 'types' play a more significant role in Australian visual culture produced in the first part of the twentieth century. German, and to a lesser extent Turkish, villains feature in numerous films produced in Australia during both world wars. In this chapter, we argue that in the short term Australian film portrayals of the 'the cruel Hun' and 'noble Turk' encouraged glorification of soldiers in Australian and New Zealand Army Corps (ANZAC), while in the long term these perpetuated a more nationalistic construction of the Anzac legend' (Publication abstract)
