This tale about religion and justice was made at Universal and directed by Douglas Sirk, just as he was beginning his run of notable '50s melodramas. He had previously directed Claudette Colbert in the independently produced noir thriller SLEEP MY LOVE. This time she is not playing a victimized wife but is instead a benevolent nun drawn into a murder mystery.
The script is based on a hit British play by Charlotte Hastings, which had transferred to Broadway the same year this film was released. Margaret Webster had the lead on Broadway. In England, the sleuthing nun was portrayed by Flora Robson, and a BBC radio recreation from 1968 with Miss Robson can be found online. Robson had a role in another play written by Hastings in the early 1970s called The Enquiry.
I mention The Enquiry, because in that later offering, Hastings revisits some of the same themes that she presents in Bonaventure/The High Ground (which was the title before Universal rechristened it as THUNDER ON THE HILL). The Enquiry concerns itself with punishment, strained relations and various crimes surrounding the imprisonment of several convicted women.
This earlier story by Hastings is also about a convicted woman. In THUNDER ON THE HILL, Ann Blyth is cast as Valerie Carns (named Sarat Carn in the play), a convicted murderess who is about to be executed the following morning. She is being transferred to the facility where the execution is to take place, but a raging storm and subsequent flood force the guards that are transporting her to take refuge with her inside a British convent in a village near Norwich in the fenlands.
The convent houses an order of nursing nuns, and Sister Bonaventure (Colbert) is in charge, though she reports to a Mother Superior (Gladys Cooper). Bonaventure meets Valerie, hears her story, and decides the young woman sentenced to death is not guilty. From here, the story shifts gears into a detective drama, with Sister trying to put the pieces together of what really happened. Once she figures out who the guilty party is, she works to procure a confession out of said individual. It's all quite gripping, with excellent performances by Colbert and Blyth.
Part of what helps this sort of spiritual/detective drama work so well with the audience is that it combines faith and justice. Also, we have a group of respectable characters (the nuns) juxtaposed with a supposedly hardened villain (the convicted killer)...even though the head nun doesn't believe the girl is really a killer. Time is running out; tension mounts throughout, and the two main characters ultimately work together towards a solution, which leads to a second chance at life.
The script is based on a hit British play by Charlotte Hastings, which had transferred to Broadway the same year this film was released. Margaret Webster had the lead on Broadway. In England, the sleuthing nun was portrayed by Flora Robson, and a BBC radio recreation from 1968 with Miss Robson can be found online. Robson had a role in another play written by Hastings in the early 1970s called The Enquiry.
I mention The Enquiry, because in that later offering, Hastings revisits some of the same themes that she presents in Bonaventure/The High Ground (which was the title before Universal rechristened it as THUNDER ON THE HILL). The Enquiry concerns itself with punishment, strained relations and various crimes surrounding the imprisonment of several convicted women.
This earlier story by Hastings is also about a convicted woman. In THUNDER ON THE HILL, Ann Blyth is cast as Valerie Carns (named Sarat Carn in the play), a convicted murderess who is about to be executed the following morning. She is being transferred to the facility where the execution is to take place, but a raging storm and subsequent flood force the guards that are transporting her to take refuge with her inside a British convent in a village near Norwich in the fenlands.
The convent houses an order of nursing nuns, and Sister Bonaventure (Colbert) is in charge, though she reports to a Mother Superior (Gladys Cooper). Bonaventure meets Valerie, hears her story, and decides the young woman sentenced to death is not guilty. From here, the story shifts gears into a detective drama, with Sister trying to put the pieces together of what really happened. Once she figures out who the guilty party is, she works to procure a confession out of said individual. It's all quite gripping, with excellent performances by Colbert and Blyth.
Part of what helps this sort of spiritual/detective drama work so well with the audience is that it combines faith and justice. Also, we have a group of respectable characters (the nuns) juxtaposed with a supposedly hardened villain (the convicted killer)...even though the head nun doesn't believe the girl is really a killer. Time is running out; tension mounts throughout, and the two main characters ultimately work together towards a solution, which leads to a second chance at life.