This British WW II-era resistance drama was highly recommended by Weda Mosellie a while back and I concur with her judgment.  Conspiracy of Hearts (1960) is a fine, suspenseful and dramatically solid movie.  The nuns at an Italian convent are smuggling children out of a German concentration camp and the new camp commandant isn’t happy about it.  In a powerful finale at the convent the war becomes very personal for the nuns.

The beauty of this project is that it takes a familiar situation and makes it real, poignant and moving.  Director Ralph Thomas strives to make his characters, particularly the German commandant (Albert Lieven) and the Italian former camp commander (Ronald Lewis), real people with different ways of approaching the same situation.  Their conflict is inevitable.

The Mother Superior (Lilli Palmer) radiates sanctimony but Palmer’s performance is heartfelt.  It also doesn’t hurt that her face is often angelic.  Few of the other nuns show much character development but those who do are noteworthy, especially Sylvia Syms (as novice Sister Mitya).

As one might expect, Conspiracy of Hearts displays a great deal of respect for religion, but not just for the  Catholicism of the nuns.  The children they rescue are Jewish, so the nuns devise a way of caring for their spiritual needs, too.  These nuns are almost, but not quite, too good to be true.  My rating:  ☆ ☆ ☆.  (10:2).