The Seventh Cross

With Tracy heading the cast and a host of great character actors in support, it's hardly surprising that the performances are the most memorable aspect of Zinnemann's first major feature. Tracy pulls all the stops out as one of seven anti-Nazi Germans escaping from a concentration camp in 1936, and heading (with the Gestapo in pursuit) for Holland and freedom; en route, his bitterness dissipates and his faith in human nature is restored. Polished professionalism all round, in fact, with the odyssey tensely evoked in the studio by ace cameraman Karl Freund.