During the Second World War, a captured German spy is executed at the Tower of London, without revealing the whereabouts of Professor Hansen, a refugee Swedish scientist in Britain. He is believed to be unwittingly passing information on the atomic bomb to Germany through the neutral Irish Free State. British intelligence attempts to locate him and break this link.[4]
Two intelligence officers, Captain Grant and Captain Wilson, travel incognito on the overnight ferry to Dublin. They observe the German contact, Keitel, and their suspicion falls on lawyer Paul Faber. Grant manages to get a clerical job in Faber's London office, using a false identity. He allows himself to be exposed as an ex-army officer who's gone AWOL, and allows himself to be blackmailed by Faber into doing a number of illegal jobs. These include a marriage of convenience to Marion, a young Austrian girl who is desperate to acquire British nationality; also the theft of some radioactive items from a docks warehouse.
Eventually, the trail leads Grant, Hunter and the police to the fictional village of Hunstable in Devon, and from there to a cliff-edge mansion where Hansen is being hidden. A showdown in a sea cave under the mansion leaves the police triumphant.
Grant is directed to a room where his wife, Marion, is held. She expects a spy is entering and breaks a vase on his head. The film end with her kneeling next to him saying "Oh David".
The Monthly Film Bulletin wrote: "Robert Newton is always a pleasure to watch, with his precise movements and quick, glancing looks. Guy Middleton and Raymond Lovell beat their respective paths of asinine comedy and respectably disguised villainy, whilst a newcomer, Muriel Pavlow, plays the usual lady of doubtful allegiance but pathetic exterior. But if you are susceptible, as the reviewer is, to the hair-breadth, imminent and deadly then the film is most entertaining. Its excitements are continuous, and although it is a box-office piece it wears the air of enjoying itself immensely, which is captivating, anyway."[6]
C.A. Lejeune in The Observer said the film was "effectively done in a small way and has the frankly preposterous zest of a boys' adventure story."[7]
In British Sound Films: The Studio Years 1928–1959David Quinlan rated the film as "good", writing: "Well-developed spy thriller, a catalogue of breathless excitements."[8]
Leslie Halliwell called it a "Generally watchable low key thriller with familiar British ingredients."[9]
The Radio Times Guide to Films gave the film 2/5 stars, writing: "This B-thriller is worth seeing for its treatment of a topical theme – atomic weapons – and the performance of Robert Newton, then on the cusp of stardom."[10]
References
^Vincent Porter, 'The Robert Clark Account', Historical Journal of Film, Radio and Television, Vol 20 No 4, 2000 p483
^"Night Boat to Dublin". Monthly Film Bulletin. Vol. 13, no. 145. London. 1 January 1946. p. 2.
^"NIGHT BOAT TO DUBLIN. (Directed by Lawrence Huntington.) Pathé. Associated British Hughes, Maud". Picture Show. Vol. 50, no. 1232. London. 9 February 1946. p. 2.
