The Only Way (1970) User Reviews

Watch it for Jane Seymour

[phd_travel · 6/10 · 26 August 2017]

This Danish made and filmed movie about the rescue of Jews in WW2 is quite good even though there are a few unnecessary faults and it can feel awkward compared to a Hollywood movie like Counterfeit Traitor.

The use of many Danish actors and the on location filming makes this a very authentic non glamorized war movie.

It's quite delightful to see a very young and beautiful Jane Seymour dancing ballet. She plays the daughter of the family. There is no contrived romance to get in the way. There are no crazy heroics either or overly sadistic Nazi monsters. One gets to see a broad view of how the Danish helped the Jews escape by train boat hiding hospitals etc.

There is a rather intrusive music that distracts from certain scenes.

Worth a watch.

True to Actual Events

[olsontd-1 · 7/10 · 15 March 2018]

This portrayal of Danish rescuers of Jews in World War II is the fictional story of how one family's world was turned upside down when the Nazi occupiers in Denmark (since 1940) moved against the Jews of Denmark in violation of their own agreement with Danish leaders that the Jews in Denmark would be left alone. In the fall of 1943, the Germans plotted to gather the Jews of Denmark for deportation on a Jewish holiday evening when the vast majority of Jews would be at home. Jews were so well integrated in Danish society, that no public government records identified the religious affiliations of the population. Thus, the Nazis had to steal the records from Jewish organizations in order to know where to find them. The story illustrates the surprise and refusal of many to believe a round up of Jews would actually take place. The pace of the movie is neither plodding nor frenetic. The tension builds and is enhanced by the bewilderment and on-the-spot decision-making by a specific family and their would-be rescuers. Having read the 1955 book, "October 1943", by actual rescuer Aage Bertelsen, I resonated with virtually every incident faced by those at risk. Although this is not a polished film by modern film-making standards, the content and context of the events is accurately presented. A major strength of the movie is the extensive on- location filming in Copenhagen, and the use of Danish actors.

The Only Way

[CinemaSerf · 6/10 · 3 June 2023]

This is quite an interesting depiction of the activities of the Danish underground during their WWII occupation by the Nazis. It centres around the Jewish "Stein" family, and of the attempts by the courageous local population to shelter them, and to help them escape to safety. It features a gently engaging performance from a young Jane Seymour, and a host of Danish talent that add authenticity to the piece. It is a little light-weight at times, but the narrative makes no bones about the attitude of most of the people to do what they can to thwart the ambitions of their overlords - and that story is riddled with bravery and potency. The production is a bit limited, it can't have had much of a budget, but what we have here is food for thought, especially for those of us whose nations did not find themselves with unwanted house-guests during the war.

Dutch bravery during Occupation by the Germans

[blanche-2 · 7/10 · 22 December 2019]

Tense, suspenseful film about how the Dutch networked to save Dutch Jews once the Germans started rounding them up. In order to occupy Holland, the Germans had to agree not to prosecute the Jews. In 1943, they broke that promise. It was then that the Dutch began rescue operations. At its narrowest point, Holland is only 8 miles from Sweden - but it seemed like thousands.

The Jews were very well integrated into Dutch society, so it wasn't a simple matter for Nazis to locate them. And the Dutch rallied to protect them. They were hidden in quarantine wards in hospitals and other places while transport was arranged. At one point, when people are getting into a taxi to get out of town, a horse-drawn wagon, by pre-arrangement, blocks the Nazis view of the cab.

This is a small film, so we only see a microcosm of the work of the Dutch, focusing on one Jewish family, the Steins. The Stein daughter is 19-year-old Jane Seymour in what is I believe her debut, and she's lovely.

Very inspiring. The bravery and tenacity of the people in this country is remarkable.

Ruined by the soundtrack

[david-2348 · 4/10 · 16 March 2013]

I like war movies. I like movies about the Jews in World War II. So this movie gets 4 stars just for being a movie about the Jews in World War II. However, this is by far the worst movie of its type I have ever seen. If you aren't a fan of this type of movie, then it has no saving graces and would probably only be worth 1 or 2 points at most. As a viewer I felt no tension whatsoever, despite the topic being one which should have been dripping with tension from start to finish. This was largely down to the musical score, which was totally inappropriate for the type of movie it was. It's as if the orchestra made the score without any reference to the movie content itself. Just re-doing the musical score to something appropriate would probably lift the movie's rating a point or two.

A telling of one of the great stories of WWII from Denmark

[vampire_hounddog · 4/10 · 21 August 2020]

In German occupied Denmark during WWII, since the German invasion in 1940, the Danes had mostly been left in peace. In October 1943 word gets out that thr Nazis are planning to remove the relatively small Jewish population to concentration camps. The resistance plot to help the Jews escape.

Produced by Barry Levinson, this low budget small production tells of one of the great stories of WWII, but sadly this US-Danish production lacks much in the way of powerful drama. The period detail and location work is well done.

Danes don't think twice about helping Jews flee Nazis

[SimonJack · 8/10 · 4 October 2012]

Few people have rated this film, and only three have commented on it by this date of my posting. From two of the comments, it seems to me that we may be seeing an addiction to modern movie-making of the past decade or more. The modern viewing audience seems hooked on the thrill-a- minute, high-speed chase, explosive action and CGI makeup that is fast becoming the trademark movie of Hollywood.

"The Only Way" certainly has none of that. The plot was familiar. The script was minimal. The acting was OK. The scenes and cinematography were good – shot mostly in Denmark. The musical score was the only bad part of the movie. For the first two-thirds it was not suited at all to the picture we were seeing. Just when it got to the point of being a distraction, it changed. From then on, the music was excellent and seemed to fit the rest of the film right up to the end.

So, it is not a great film by any means, but it is a very good one, and an important one for the story it tells and how it tells it. I was never bored watching this film, because I never knew what came next. There was always a thread of suspense and mystery. Would the Steins make it, or would they be caught? Would someone turn them in? So, there was just the right amount of intrigue to keep one glued to the screen.

The one thing that raised this film considerably was what one other commenter lamented. A very minimal script, with brief lines, left the audience with no choice but to watch and absorb the people and their actions. And, in that, we saw the Danish people. They weren't flamboyant or boisterous. They smiled and frowned and acted like real people act and behave most of the time. But they were earnest and purposeful in their help. They acted with an unspoken understanding of what they needed to do.

This film really gives one a feeling for what the Danes were properly praised for after World War II. They were unflinching in their attitude toward and willingness to help their Jewish neighbors, their fellow countrymen. So, in "The Only Way," we see numerous Danish people reacting in a matter-of-fact way about helping the Steins and other Jews when word got out that the Nazis were coming for them. In no other country under Nazi occupation in World War II was there such widespread humanity and absence of prejudice. The Snope Web site describes it thus: "The rescue of several thousand Danish Jews was accomplished through the efforts of thousands of policemen, government officials, physicians, and persons of all walks of life."

"The Only Way" isn't an action-thriller by any means. But it does give a realistic picture of the people of one country who arose with spontaneity to help save the lives of a persecuted sect who were their neighbors and fellow countrymen. For that, this film is a gem and a priceless lesson for history.

Jane's debut

[BandSAboutMovies · 4/10 · 8 October 2023]

While Nazis deport the Danish Jews to extermination camps, the Danish people decide to fight them. One of the people in danger, Lillian Stein (Jane Seymour), wants to leave but her father (Ebbe Rode) wants to remain. Yet there comes a time when they must leave and it will take selling everything important to them and people giving their lives to get them away from this horror.

Directed by Bent Christensen and written by John Gould, this was Seymour's first film and wasn't available in the U. S. It's a great lesson in the past and one that we should keep in mind for now, because I always believed that these things couldn't happen any longer and today, I think that they could happen at any time. We need to study the past so that we avoid the future that is coming.

Does not flatter the Danish nation

[macz · 1/10 · 22 January 2011]

I wish I could say something positive about this film. I suspect the other review was written by a Dane who is related to the film's director, or possibly one of the actors. But I'm sure it was a Dane!

The script is quite dreadful. The characters are wooden and one dimensional and deliver their lines like robots. There are some fine Danish actors in this film who should not have necessarily been hindered by playing their respective parts in English. However, with such an awful script, no actor in the world could have injected life into such dreary dialogue.

I hope a contemporary Danish film maker will have the courage to tell this important story again one day. With a proper storyline. And a proper script.

Don't Waste Your Time

[lauriejameson · 1/10 · 23 March 2012]

To put it simply...just awful. The dialogue was boring, poorly delivered, and the characters were dull. One other tidbit, the musical score was at best, generic, at worst mundane. I can't imagine what they were thinking.

I forced myself to watch it to the end because it was a short film, and the subject matter had such potential. I expected to be engaged and looked forward to learning something about WWII that I had never read about before. I was looking forward to seeing a young Jane Seymour, but even that was a disappointment.

I suppose if you are a huge fan of Denmark, this might hold some interest for you; but otherwise, you would be better off watching a rerun of Hogan's Heroes.

Touching and straight-forward.

[Bronze · 8/10 · 17 March 2001]

With great acting on all accounts with other good aspect (including Art/Set decoration and Music Score) this becomes a great movie detailing about the heroism of the Danish Christians in protecting their Jews from the Nazis. All actors perform brilliantly making this a should-see movie. Especially for movies telling about Danes helping to save their Jewish population from the Nazi concentration camps.

A totally stilted production with wooden dialogue and wooden actors.

[dpmbusn · 2/10 · 20 December 2020]

What a waste of time.....totally discrediting one of the most heroic episodes of WWII....someone should either make a documentary, or her a capable director and some capable actors to tell it.

"A lesson to us all"

[morrisonhimself · 9/10 · 3 November 2019]

That lesson is multi-layered: German National Socialism was not just about destroying Jews -- it was about destroying individuals and individualism.

Another lesson: Because demagogues can, often easily, arise and take control of governments, it is important, in these United States, to honor our Second Amendment. (You will see the usually peaceful Danes take up arms against the invader.)

This powerful motion picture is based on the true story of how the people of Denmark, almost unanimously, arose against a tyrannical and murderous invader to protect and defend a persecuted minority.

It is mostly very well done, especially the score by the magnificent Carl Davis, and the superlative acting. Directing and editing were not quite up to the script or the acting (and the haircuts seemed anachronistic), but this is a movie I can highly recommend.

As shown here, even the German invaders, as individuals, probably draftees, could often be humane and decent, just more people caught up in the viciousness of government. But war doesn't pay much attention to individuals, except as targets, as cannon fodder.

The single most important lesson for us all is that each of us is an individual human being, and we are valuable for our own sakes. Each of us is sovereign, each of us is self-owned and we must remember and we must remind others.

Freedom is our proper and natural condition, and each of us must remember that, must remind others, and must work to protect that freedom, must work to save other individual human beings from tyrannical government.

"The Only Way" is now almost 50 years old, and the incidents it portrays are more than 65 years in the past. Yet tyranny and mass persecution are always just around the corner.

Honor those brave and generous Danes, and remember this lesson: Government is always a danger, and most especially when it forgets that "We, the People" are sovereign individuals, when it concentrates (as 2019 politicians are doing) on groups rather than individuals, and when it assumes such total control over individual human lives.

I urge everyone to see this film, which is available at YouTube.

The story of a violin

[clanciai · 8/10 · 28 June 2023]

The film begins with an auction, and one of the items is an Amati violin, which is purchased by the owner of an instrument shop, and with him is his young colleague Lars, and it's the violin, the instrument shop and the innocent Lars who become the chief victims in this film, telling the story of the German round up of Jews in Denmark in 1944, which turned out a formidable failure. They were hoping to catch all the Jews of Copenhagen in one strike, and all they got was a poor old man, as the Danes made a major contribution by standing up for every single Jew to their knowledge and helping them all escape across to Sweden. This is a true story, it is filmed in Denmark by Danes and a Danish director, and there is only one British actor in the cast, apart from Jane Seymour, who later became one of the Bond brides, but she is already excellent here. The film is very basic, there are no Hollywood tricks or special effects, and all the acting therefore gives a very natural impression. The film follows the fate of the precious violin, but we never learn what ultimately happened to it, although there are reasons to believe that the good Mr Petersen, the best actor in the film, succeeded in saving it.

Well made film of humanity triumphant over evil for a change

[bramstayer · 9/10 · 26 November 2019]

This was made years before most knew of Oscar Schindler; who was German (and in the Nazi party) but this was a more simply done film. Its a humble work compared to Spielberg's story of decency winning over greed & apathy. From 1970 Less budget but its aged ok. If you get a chance to see it I recommend this film. May make you research the history of the Scandinavians role in WW2. Which is complex for sure. Living under occupation would be a real terrifying balancing act for those who didn't welcome their new overlords. When people do nothing we know what HAPPENED in WW2. Examples are shown here as well. This is a story about those who refused to aid in the first stages of the eventual genocide. And then risked alot to save people. Ordinary folks here are just better at knowing real danger. Street level... neighbours talking to each other. Once was a normal thing. I hope this film plays more on streaming etc. It reminds us hope is still valid even during the most hateful chapters of our history. The music was a tad annoying but the use of real Danish & German actors gave this a realistic feel to it. If anything it was probably too tidy. Glad they made this though. Real Jewish-Anglo actress Jane Seymore looks 17 BTW. Oh thats likely cause she was just a teen.