The Enemy Below

The Enemy Below is a 1957 American DeLuxe Color war film in CinemaScope about a battle between an American destroyer escort and a German U-boat during World War II. Produced and directed by Dick Powell, the movie stars Robert Mitchum and Curt Jürgens as the American and German commanding officers, respectively. The film was based on the 1956 novel of the same name by Denys Rayner, a British naval officer involved in antisubmarine warfare throughout the Battle of the Atlantic. Plot The American USS Haynes detects and attacks a German U-boat (Unterseeboot) that is on its way to rendezvous with a German merchant raider in the South Atlantic Ocean. Lieutenant Commander Murrell, a former officer in the Merchant Marine and now an active-duty officer in the Naval Reserve, has recently taken command of the Haynes, though he is still recovering from injuries incurred in the sinking of his previous ship. Before the U-boat is first spotted, one sailor questions the new captain's fitness and ability. As the battle begins, though, Murrell proves himself a match for wily U-boat Kapitän zur See von Stolberg, a man who is not enamored with the Nazi regime, in a prolonged and deadly battle of wits that tests both men and their crews. Each man grows to respect his opponent. Murrell skillfully stalks the U-boat and subjects von Stolberg and his crew to hourly depth-charge attacks. In the end, von Stolberg takes advantage of Murrell's predictable pattern of attacks and succeeds in torpedoing the destroyer escort. Although the Haynes is sinking, it is still battle-capable, and Murrell has one final plan; he orders his men to set fires on the deck to make the ship look more damaged than it actually is. He then orders the majority of his crew to evacuate in the lifeboats, but retains a skeleton crew to man the bridge, engine room, and one of his ship's guns. As Murrell had hoped, von Stolberg surfaces before firing his torpedoes, keeping the deck gun trained on the ship. Murrell orders his gun crew to fire first at the U-boat's stern to immobilize it, and then at the deck gun. Murrell rams the U-boat. With his boat sinking, von Stolberg orders his crew to set scuttling charges and abandon ship. Murrell, the last man aboard, is about to join his crew in the lifeboats when he spots von Stolberg standing on the conning tower of the sinking U-boat with his injured executive officer Oberleutnant zur See Heini Schwaffer.