During WWI, after the German invasion of Poland, the British make plans for a counter offense. Germany’s spy ring, however, manages to thwart the British at every turn. The British need to find a way to ferret out the German spies that are wreaking so much havoc with British intelligence. The only thing the British have figured out is that a master spy named Franz Strendler is responsible, but no one knows what he looks like.
To handle the situation the British send Frank Bennett (Bruce Lester) to pick up their best agent who is currently undercover in Germany. Frank’s plane gets shot down over France and is found by friendly troops. He ends up in the hospital.
In the meantime, German agent Helen von Lorbeer (Margaret Lindsay) is sent to England posing as Frances Hautry, a refugee. She is placed in the home of Cabinet Minister Arthur Bennett (Holmes Herbert). The Bennett family valet is Valdar (Boris Karloff). He is also a secret agent for Germany.
Arthur Bennett’s secretary, Miss Risdon (Louise Brien) is another German spy. Frances visits Arthur’s office. Also in the waiting room is an intelligence agent, Crichton (John Graham Spacey). When Miss Risdon sends a coded message to Frances using her typewriter keys, Crichton realizes that the two women are really spies. He notifies Arthur. Crichton, Arthur and Colonel James Yates (Leonard Mudie) try to set a trap for her, but she manages to fool them. Another spy, Thompson tries to tell Helene that Valdar is actually working for the British. With all the spies and double agents involved, finding the formidable Strendler is proving to be difficult.
“British Intelligence” AKA “Enemy Agent” AKA “Secret Enemy” was released in 1939 and was directed by Terry O. Morse. It is a low budget American spy thriller. The movie was based on the 1918 play “Three Faces East” by Anthony Paul Kelly. The film was released in the U.S. in 1940. There were also two film adaptations done as “Three Faces East”, a silent one in 1926 and a pre-code version in 1930.
The film is mostly your standard spy drama. It is full of Spies, counterspies and double spies. There are so many spies that it is difficult to follow who is a British spy and who is a German spy. The movie takes place during WWI but was shot and released during WWII, so it is also a lot of propaganda. I found the movie to be easy to watch but difficult to keep all the spies straight. It appears to look as if half of the people in Britain are German spies.
Some of the spying techniques in the film were actually used at one time during WWI. If you are a fan of espionage, intrigue and lots of double agents then you will enjoy this film. If you are a Boris Karloff completist then this is also a movie you want.