This is one of the stranger films to come out in the aftermath of the US entry into World War II. It's mainly a comedy, but one with an incredibly dark undercurrent. Monty Woolley plays a very English Englishman who is caught in eastern France in 1940 when the Nazis invade. One might ask what he was doing there, since it should have been clear that the area wasn't exactly safe, but no matter. He's got fishing to do, and he's English, so he's going to do it. When he learns of the invasion, he decides to rush home to England and do whatever he can to help, even though his services were turned down by every government office in London because he was too old.

The title refers to the fact that, as the film progresses, he finds himself leading an ever-larger train of children out of harm's way. It starts with the two children of an English couple who work for the League of Nations; they want Howard to take Ronnie (Roddy McDowall) and Sheila (Peggy Ann Garner) with him, and despite the fact that he dislikes children in general and Ronnie in particular, he agrees (Woolley apparently disliked children in real life, offering to "pat each of the little darlings on their heads until they drop dead" during filming). But his trip home becomes unexpectedly longer, and at each stop the resourceful Ronnie welcomes another child to their party. Also joining the party is Nicole Rougeron (Anne Baxter), who had a short romance with Howard's son the summer before, which was cut short when the son, an RAF pilot, was shot down. When the group reaches northern France where the bulk of the Nazi forces are concentrated, they encounter an additional problem: Howard's very Englishness. Eventually, after they arrange an escape aboard a fishing boat piloted by Foquet (Marcel Dalio), they're captured by the Nazis.

In the guise of being an almost family-friendly picture, it manages to be both a remarkably prescient acknowledgement of the extent of Hitler's madness and a weirdly humanizing statement that not all Nazis were monsters. Although it was made in 1942, it openly acknowledges both Hitler's concentration camps and the fact that a young half-Jewish girl, even though she's as blonde as they come, won't survive in either Germany or occupied France. I'm not positive, but I think that very few American films admitted this much as early as 1942.

Then in the character of Major Diessen (Otto Preminger), who captures Howard and his charges, we also have a strange entry in the history of World War 2 era films: a Nazi who is, if not exactly a good guy, at least a human being. With his shining, cueball head and his impeccable accent, Preminger, who is better known to most as a director, enters the film as a terrifying figure: he believes that Howard is a spy, and he's willing to torture both Howard and the children to get at what he thinks is the truth. But as the film progresses toward its ending, he becomes more than just a bad guy. His interrogations of Howard turn into debates about American, British, and German values. His inability to accept the idea of altruism, of which Howard is a prime example, convinces him that the old man is lying, especially when it comes to Howard's plans for the children. Howard says that he'll ship them off to America to live with his daughter and her American husband, to which Diessen replies, "He's an American! Why should he concern himself with half a dozen European children? And what about the Jewish child?" (He was likely correct about the latter.) This is pure pro-American propaganda, yes, but it's rare to see it presented like this, with two equally matched (and equally charismatic) opponents.

Woolley got a lot of mileage out of his grumpy demeanor. The best scenes in the film feature him arguing with McDowall, who patronizes him, a fact that irritates the old man to no end. He begins the film as the leader, but soon he comes to rely on the children: on their ability to speak French, on their unspoken communication with other children, and on their resourcefulness. Director Irving Pichel, working from a script by Nunnally Johnson that was based on a serialized novel by Nevil Shute (author of On the Beach)novel, keeps things moving and shows a real knack for balancing the comedic and more serious aspects of the film. He manages to keep it family-friendly without shrinking away from the horrors of war.

The film was nominated for three Oscars, but didn't win any: Picture, Black-and-White Cinematography (Edward Cronjager), and Actor (Woolley). Two years later, he would receive another Oscar nomination in Since You Went Away, where he played similar character: a curmudgeon who was too old to help fight the war, who grudgingly befriends a child, and whose son is a soldier.

—January 15, 2006