Desperate Journey

"In the darkest of times, love survives."

2025 1h 48m EN

🙌

8.3

BANGER

★8.3TMDB · 3

HistoryWarThriller

Synopsis

Spoiler shield

The true story of Freddie Knoller, a young Jewish man who flees Vienna following the Nazi occupation in 1938 and finds solace in the vibrant world of Paris's burlesque scene.

“In the darkest of times, love survives.”

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Cast

Lucas Lynggaard Tønnesen
Freddie Knoller
Clara Rugaard
Jaqueline
Fernando Guallar
Christos
Til Schweiger
Officer Kurt
Sienna Guillory
Mrs. Knoller
Steven Berkoff
Raphael
Hugo Speer
Pierre
George Sear
Eric

Credits

Behind the camera

Director: Annabel Jankel
Writers: Michael Radford
Languages: English
Countries: United Kingdom

Want more? Switch to Cinephile mode in the header for DP, composer, budget, box office, production companies, keywords, and release history.

Did you know?

Fun facts 🍿

1 / 5

ERA

Did you know

Released last year.

MoodPlayr · trivia#01

2 / 5

CAST

Did you know

Lucas Lynggaard Tønnesen and Clara Rugaard and Fernando Guallar carry the top of the cast.

MoodPlayr · trivia#02

3 / 5

FACT

Did you know

Marketing tagline: "In the darkest of times, love survives.".

MoodPlayr · trivia#03

4 / 5

WILD

Did you know

IMDB entry: tt32152229 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.

MoodPlayr · trivia#04

5 / 5

WILD

Did you know

Only 3 TMDB ratings — you're getting ahead of the curve on this one.

MoodPlayr · trivia#05

Cinephile deep dive

The take

Annabel Jankel directs. Produced in United Kingdom. Dialogue in English.

Trivia

Things worth knowing

1Released last year.
2Lucas Lynggaard Tønnesen and Clara Rugaard and Fernando Guallar carry the top of the cast.
3Marketing tagline: "In the darkest of times, love survives.".
4IMDB entry: tt32152229 — still the authoritative cross-reference for credits and trivia.
5Only 3 TMDB ratings — you're getting ahead of the curve on this one.

The technical file

Runtime: 108 min · 1h 48m
Status: Released
Original language: EN
Certification (US): 15
IMDB: Desperate Journey (2025)

Also by

Annabel Jankel

Trailers & featurettes

Watch the pieces

Community reviews

What people are saying

CinemaSerf2025-12-04
★ 7/10
With the Anschluß upon them, the Knoller family of Austrian Jews are facing the seizure of their property and their removal to internment camps. Desperate, they try to send their son Eric to an uncle in Florida whilst smuggling the other one, Freddie, to safety in the UK. Unfortunately for this latter lad (Lucas Lynggaard Tønnesen), the wheels come off his plans and he finds himself alone in the forest seeking shelter from the cold and from the pursuing Nazis. A stroke of luck sees him on a train, but only to a Paris already under occupation and just as ready to persecute it’s Jews. Again, fortune smiles upon him as he stumbles upon a nightclub where “Christos” (Fernando Guallar) sees his potential acting as a fluent German speaking host for their new, well heeled and womanising, occupiers. Freddie takes to this task like a duck to water and hopes he can quickly earn the 500 Francs new papers are going to cost, but events overtake him and he is soon in love with high class singer/hooker Jacqueline (Clara Rugaard) and also embroiled in the activities of the resistance. Unsure whom he can trust, he now wants two sets of papers and those are going to cost more than money. Now it doesn’t really help that the film is interspersed with scenes from the end of the war, and it is also a true story, so any sense of jeopardy throughout the main body of this drama is a bit limited. That said, though, Tønnesen delivers confidently as he flies by the seat of his pants into a den of bullies in uniform ingratiating and alienating himself as he goes. Both he and Rugaard inject quite a bit of humanity to a story that leaves much of it’s brutality to our imagination and to sparing performances from Til Schweiger and Jack Morris as suitably odious soldiers to whom the locals had no more status than the pigeons. Steven Berkoff makes a couple of cameos, but they don’t really make so much difference to a film that is well held by a young actor who presents us with a poignant characterisation of just what a man must do to survive without becoming a monster of his own making. The production design is classy, there are a couple of quite powerfully delivered on-stage ballads and on the whole, this is quite a decent story of escape, tenacity and consequences.

Production companies