Yesterday's Enemy is a 1959 Hammer Films British war film in MegaScope directed by Val Guest and starring Stanley Baker, Guy Rolfe, Leo McKern and Gordon Jackson set in the Burma Campaign during World War II. It is based on a 1958 BBC teleplay by Peter R. Newman, who turned it into a three-act play in 1960. The TV play was reportedly based on a war crime perpetrated by a British army captain in Burma in 1942. Gordon Jackson repeated his role from the BBC teleplay as Sgt. Ian McKenzie.
Columbia Pictures co-produced the film with Hammer Films in an agreement for five co-productions a year with Columbia providing half the finance.[ The film, including extensive jungle and swamp scenes, was shot entirely on indoor sets in black and white and Megascope. The film has no musical score.
Director Val Guest later said that Yesterday's Enemy was one of his films of which he was the most proud. In 2013, film magazine Total Film included Yesterday's Enemy in their list of 50 Amazing Films You've Probably Never Seen.
Plot
The lost remnants of a British Army brigade headquarters make their way through the Burmese jungle, retreating from the Japanese. The group, numbering over thirty, is led by Captain Alan Langford because the most senior officer, a brigadier, is one of several who are wounded. The group arrives at a small village which is enemy-occupied. After a short but costly battle, the small detachment of Japanese soldiers in the village is wiped out.
Among the Japanese dead is a colonel, an unusually high-ranking officer to be with such a small group. The dead officer possesses a map with unknown markings. A Burmese man is caught trying to flee and he is revealed to be an informer employed by the Japanese. Langford interrogates the man about the dead colonel and the map and when he refuses to talk, Langford selects two men from amongst the villagers, saying he will have them both executed if the informer does not co-operate. The villagers plead for mercy and the doctor, a civilian correspondent named Max and the padre angrily protest at Langford's decision, but the captain is unmoved. The two hostages are killed by Langford's men, prompting the informer to begin divulging what he knows. The map contains plans for a major Japanese flanking attack which aims to cut off the British army from its supply lines and leave it surrounded. Langford is anxious to send a warning, but the group's radio has been damaged.
