Captain Von Schoenvorts


Anyone else really, really like this guy? At the time the movie was made he was a welcome change from the "Rrrrraaahhh, Germans BAD!" cliche in movies set during either World War, and he's also a step up from Burroughs' novel. Don't get me wrong, I love the book, but Von Schoenvorts is such an insufferable dick in it. When they made the movie, all of Von Schoenvorts' bad traits got transferred to the movie-only character of Dietz, so the story was still able to have a German officer who was a big fat jerk, but also have one who was relatively resonable and insightful.

I think my favorite scene with him is when he's explaining to Lisa why he torpedoed the British ship:

Lisa: That ship you torpedoed contained nothing but innocent passengers! Women and children!
Von Schoenvorts: And a hold full of arms and ammunition that would've have been used to kill women and children in MY country.

Not saying he's a saint or anything, just that the screenwriter (not to mention the actor) did a commendable job on making Von Schoenvorts feel like an actual person, with both good traits and bad ones, as opposed to the cardboard cutout villain he was in Burroughs' book (Dietz fills THAT role in the movie, as noted).

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Oh, yes. A fascinating, likeable character, so obviously someone formidable as an enemy and easy to get along with as a friend. They were lucky to have him along, I think, when they got to the island. And John McEnery is excellent. I remember him playing Mercutio.

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Did he definately know that the British ship contained weapons and ammo before firing the torpedos?

Coz I always assumed that he didn't know that until after the ship blew up and sank.

The way he says 'why else would it have blown up so quickly' sounded like a snide remark and made me feel that he fired on the ship just because it was British, then justifies it by pointing out that there were in fact weapons and ammo on board.

And from what I remember Lisa gives him a horrified look (not certain on that as havn't seen it for awhile).

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"The way he says 'why else would it have blown up so quickly' sounded like a snide remark and made me feel that he fired on the ship just because it was British, then justifies it by pointing out that there were in fact weapons and ammo on board"

Maybe he had twinges of guilt niggling away at him (but obviously couldn't have admitted it as they were at war). But look at his reaction when he sees the Montrose exploding. Or the way he says "these were civilians" to his second-in-command.

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In the book, he was engaged to the Miss Clayton, called Lys La Rue in the book. Accidentally sinking your fiancé's ship is truly bad form. :-) I recall that it was an arranged marriage.
I think the captain was written as "typical" Prussian nobleman with an extremely strong sense of duty.
Though I don't question the idea of an American woman being engaged to a highly placed German. I do find it odd that the same woman would take a British ship to join him! It makes sense to me that she would take passage on a ship from a neutral country such as Sweden.
I may be wrong here, but I recall something like that.

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His "these were civilians" line was in response to Dietz's thinly-veiled suggestion that they kill the survivors. Von Schoenvorts was forbidding it by reminding Dietz they were civilians, and therefore off-limits.

Von Schoenvorts is definitely a guy who sees things as a means to an end, but who avoids brutality, i.e., the impersonal act of sinking the ship was something he could live with, but shooting the survivors was something he couldn't. As I said in my original post, he isn't a saint, but he was definitely humanized a lot compared to his book counterpart.

"I mean, really, how many times will you look under Jabba's manboobs?"

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Presumably he had some intel about the vessel. Perhaps German naval command knew of the arms shipment and radioed the U-33 and told von Schoenvorts to sink it. Lisa's horrified look could be construed as horror and disbelief that her country would be using civilian ships to transport arms.

"I mean, really, how many times will you look under Jabba's manboobs?"

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Dietz was a character in the novel as well. He was basically mindless muscle for von Schoenvorts.

Requiescat in pace, Krystle Papile. I'll always miss you. Justice was finally served.

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