The Last Chance / Die letzte Chance

country, year

Switzerland, 1945

genre

drama

running time

113′

directed by

Leopold Lindtberg

languages

German, Italian, English, French, Yiddish, Dutch, Polish

subtitles 

Slovene subtitles

about the film

September 1943, Northern Italy. Two prisoners of war, an American and a British soldier, escape from a Nazi train bound for Germany. A village priest offers them shelter and helps them escape to Switzerland. The two young men soon find themselves in the role of smugglers when they agree to take a caravan of Jewish refugees of different ages and nationalities across the border. With the Nazis at their heels, they try to cross the mountains to Switzerland …

what was said about the film

“The story of the film is an innocent fairy tale compared to reality. /…/ It is not a film for those who have experienced misfortune, but for everyone else – the lucky, the privileged – to make them think.”

– Leopold Lindtberg

about the author

Leopold Lindtberg (1902-1984) was an Austrian Swiss film and theatre director. He fled Austria due to the Machtergreifung in Germany and ultimately settled in Switzerland. He directed many award-winning films and theatre plays, many of them dealing with the topic of the second world war.

festivals and awards

  • recepient of the Golden Globe in 1946
  •  International Film Festival of Cannes 1946: Grand Prix and International Peace Prize for The Last Chance

filmography

Wenn zwei sich streiten (1932)

Jä-soo! (1935)

Füsilier Wipf (1938)

Constable Studer (1939)

Die missbrauchten Liebesbriefe (1940)

Landammann Stauffacher (1941)

Marie-Louise (1944)

The Last Chance (1945)

Madness Rules (1947)

Swiss Tour (Ein Seemann ist kein Schneemann) (1949)

Four in a Jeep (1951)

The Village (1953)