annabellabray Review of Nancy Wake

Nancy Wake (1987)

Well made & acted but a shocking slander in one scene

[5/10 · 5 July 2022]

Having just read a fictionalized version of Nancy Wake's life, 'Code Name Helene' by Ariel Lawhon, in which the author is transparent & careful about her use of the facts, I was very disappointed to watch the scene in episode 1 in which 'Patrick O'Leary' (actually a Belgian war hero Major General Albert Guerisse using an assumed name to work undercover for the British) is shown being tortured and betraying Nancy & the rest of the network .This never happened. He was arrested and tortured, twice in fact, and he never betrayed anyone. Seeing as he was still alive at the time this series was made, it seems a gross injustice to his memory. I realise dramatizations of reality have to combine and skip over the facts but this distortion is a gross betrayal of this man's integrity.