Vitals

Cillian Murphy as Jozef Gabčík, Czechoslovak Army soldier and SOE agent

Prague, Spring 1942

Film: Anthropoid
Release Date: September 9, 2016
Director: Sean Ellis
Costume Designer: Josef Cechota

WARNING! Spoilers ahead!

Background

This week in 1942, one of the most evil officials of the Third Reich (and that’s saying something!) finally succumbed to injuries received after he was ambushed by two Czechoslovak Army soldiers operating on behalf of the Special Operations Executive (SOE).

The SOE had collaborated with Czechoslovak intelligence to plan “Operation Anthropoid”—the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich, the Nazi security chief who helped organize Kristallnacht and was considered a principal architect of the Holocaust. As Deputy Protector of Bohemia and Moravia, Heydrich’s brutality earned him nicknames like the “Butcher of Prague”, making him a strategic target for the exiled Czechoslovak government. From among nearly 2,000 Czechoslovak Army personnel now exiled to England, Czechoslovak intelligence chief František Moravec selected two dozen—including paratroopers Jozef Gabčík, Jan Kubiš, and Karel Svoboda—to be trained by the SOE in Scotland for the dangerous mission to remove Heydrich. Continue reading →