Philip Dorn

Philip Dorn

Born: September 30, 1901
Died: May 9, 1975
in Scheveningen, 's-Gravenhage, Zuid-Holland, Netherlands
Frits van Dongen (1901–1975), born Hein van der Niet and sometimes billed as Philip Dorn, was a Dutch actor who had a career in Hollywood. As a teenager he moved out of his parental home to perform in an amateur theatre group; his stage name Frits van Dongen already dates from that period. In the early 1920s, Van Dongen ended up in the professional stage, but it was not until 1934 that he starred in his first film: 'Op Hoop van Zegen'. This film marked his breakthrough as a film star in the Netherlands: in 1935 he played in 'De Big van het Regiment', 'De Kribbebijter' and 'Op Stap' and in 1936 in 'Rubber'. Van Dongen then left for Berlin to work with the likes of Veit Harlan and star in a number of successful German films.

In 1939 Van Dongen and his second wife, Jewish actress Marianne van Dam, left for the United States at the invitation of director Henry Koster, who had directed Van Dongen in 'De Kribbebijter'. When he was given a seven-year contract at MGM, Van Dongen changed his name to Philip Dorn. After making his American debut in 1940 with 'Enemy Agent', he would frequently be cast as continental lover, anti-Nazi German or refugee. In 1952 he returned to Europe for several German films and a Dutch theatre tour with Lily Bouwmeester. In 1953 he quit acting in films, partly due to speech problems due to a concussion. He retired for the rest of his life in California, where he died.

Movies for Philip Dorn...

Salto Mortale
Title: Salto Mortale
Character: Cadenos
Released: December 17, 1954
Type: Movie
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Dreaming Lips
Title: Dreaming Lips
Character: Michael
Released: January 29, 1953
Type: Movie
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Türme des Schweigens
Title: Türme des Schweigens
Character: Captain de Vries
Released: September 30, 1952
Type: Movie
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Behind Monastery Walls
Title: Behind Monastery Walls
Character: Thomas Holinka
Released: April 21, 1952
Type: Movie
Thomas Holinka has returned home from war and captivity. In the absence of a suitable home, he finds himself in what seems to be an abandoned monastery. When the nuns return, a conflict is inevitable because Holinka is addicted to alcohol and gambling .
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Sealed Cargo
Title: Sealed Cargo
Character: Konrad
Released: May 19, 1951
Type: Movie
A Newfoundland fishingboat comes to the aid of a wrecked Danish sailing ship and tows it to a small village, but eventually the captain of the fishingboat realises that it's a U-boat supply ship in disguise, loaded with torpedoes. So, together with his crew and a group of villagers he sets about a plan to blow the ship as well as any U-boats that approach it. Based on the novel "The Gaunt Woman" by Edmund Gilligan.
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Spy Hunt
Title: Spy Hunt
Character: Paul Kopel
Released: June 8, 1950
Type: Movie
Roger Quain, escorting two zoo-bound black panthers on the train from Milan to Paris, is unaware that a Western agent, Catherine Ullven, has hidden a microfilm in the collar of one of the animals. But when the train is derailed in the Swiss Alps and the panthers escape, she is forced to involve him in her mission, which now includes enemy agents hunting the microfilm, the animals, Catherine and Roger. Corrected from an original submission by Guy Bellinger.
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The Fighting Kentuckian
Title: The Fighting Kentuckian
Character: Col. Georges Geraud
Released: September 15, 1949
Type: Movie
John Breen (John Wayne), a Kentucky militiaman falls in love with French exile Fleurette De Marchand (Vera Ralston). He discovers a plot to steal the land that Fleurette's exiles plan to settle on and aims to foil it.
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I Remember Mama
Title: I Remember Mama
Character: Papa
Released: March 9, 1948
Type: Movie
Norwegian immigrant Marta Hanson keeps a firm but loving hand on her household of four children, a devoted husband and a highly-educated lodger who reads great literature to the family every evening. Through financial crises, illnesses and the small triumphs of everyday life, Marta maintains her optimism and sense of humor, traits she passes on to her aspiring-author daughter, Katrin.
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I've Always Loved You
Title: I've Always Loved You
Character: Leopold Goronoff
Released: December 2, 1946
Type: Movie
A beautiful young concert pianist is torn between her attraction to her arrogant but brilliant maestro and her love for a farm boy she left back home.
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Escape in the Desert
Title: Escape in the Desert
Character: Philip Artveld
Released: May 1, 1945
Type: Movie
Escaped Nazi POWs hold the denizens of a California resort hostage.
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Blonde Fever
Title: Blonde Fever
Character: Peter Donay
Released: December 5, 1944
Type: Movie
Peter and Delilah are a married couple running a roadside café in Nevada. Their stable partnership turns rocky, though, with the arrival of the sultry Sally, a waitress who catches Peter's wandering eye. Delilah strikes back by hiring Sally's boyfriend as a waiter. Sally is initially dismissive of Peter's advances, but when he wins $40,000 in a lottery, she quickly pounces, turning on the charm and eyeing the easy life.
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Passage to Marseille
Title: Passage to Marseille
Character: Renault
Released: March 11, 1944
Type: Movie
A freedom-loving French journalist sacrifices his happiness and security to battle Nazi tyranny.
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Twenty Years After
Title: Twenty Years After
Character: (archive footage)
Released: January 1, 1944
Type: Movie
This short celebrates the 20th anniversary of MGM. Segments are shown from several early hits, then from a number of 1944 releases.
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Paris After Dark
Title: Paris After Dark
Character: Jean Blanchard
Released: October 15, 1943
Type: Movie
Andre Marbel is the upper-class doctor who is able to continue his practice above suspicion even though he is a leader in the French Resistance. His nurse supports his activities, but her Nazi-brainwashed husband provides the tension.
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Chetniks!
Title: Chetniks!
Character: Gen. Draja Mihailovitch
Released: January 11, 1943
Type: Movie
Subtitled The Fighting Guerillas, Chetniks tells the story of Yugoslavian guerilla fighter General Draja Mihailovitch. Based on the General's own memoirs, the film depicts Mihailovitch (played here by Philip Dorn) as a selfless idealist, leading his resistance troops, known as the Chetniks, on one raid after another against the Germans during WW II.
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Reunion in France
Title: Reunion in France
Character: Robert Cortot
Released: December 25, 1942
Type: Movie
Frenchwoman Michele de la Becque, an opponent of the Nazis in German-occupied Paris, hides a downed American flyer, Pat Talbot, and attempts to get him safely out of the country.
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Random Harvest
Title: Random Harvest
Character: Dr. Jonathan Benet
Released: December 17, 1942
Type: Movie
An amnesiac World War I vet falls in love with a music hall star, only to suffer an accident which restores his original memories but erases his post-War life.
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Calling Dr. Gillespie
Title: Calling Dr. Gillespie
Character: Dr. John Hunter Gerniede
Released: August 1, 1942
Type: Movie
Dr. Kildare's friend Dr. Gillespie is called in to investigate when a young man suffering from mental problems disappears on a killing spree.
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Tarzan's Secret Treasure
Title: Tarzan's Secret Treasure
Character: Vandermeer
Released: December 1, 1941
Type: Movie
A scientific expedition happens to discover that gold exists on Tarzan's escarpment. The villainous Medford and Vandermeer kidnap Jane and Boy to extort from Tarzan the location of the gold.
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Underground
Title: Underground
Character: Eric Franken
Released: June 28, 1941
Type: Movie
A World War II Hollywood propaganda film detailing the dark underside of Nazism and the Third Reich set between two brothers, Kurt and Erik Franken, whom are SS officers in the Nazi party. Kurt learns and exposes the evils of the system to Erik and tries to convince him of the immoral stance that marches under the symbol of the swastika.
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Ziegfeld Girl
Title: Ziegfeld Girl
Character: Franz Kolter
Released: April 25, 1941
Type: Movie
Discovery by Flo Ziegfeld changes a girl's life but not necessarily for the better, as three beautiful women find out when they join the spectacle on Broadway: Susan, the singer who must leave behind her ageing vaudevillian father; vulnerable Sheila, the working girl pursued both by a millionaire and by her loyal boyfriend from Flatbush; and the mysterious European beauty Sandra, whose concert violinist husband cannot endure the thought of their escaping from poverty by promenading her glamor in skimpy costumes.
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Escape
Title: Escape
Character: Dr. Ditten
Released: November 1, 1940
Type: Movie
An American goes to pre-war Germany to find his mother and discovers her in a concentration camp. With the help of an American-born widowed countess he seeks to engineer her escape.
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Diamond Frontier
Title: Diamond Frontier
Character: Jan Stafford De Winter
Released: September 30, 1940
Type: Movie
Story of the early days of the diamond-mining era in South Africa.
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Ski Patrol
Title: Ski Patrol
Character: Viktor Ryder
Released: May 9, 1940
Type: Movie
In 1939, a group of Finnish soldiers defend the border from Russian invaders.
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Enemy Agent
Title: Enemy Agent
Character: Jeffry Arnold
Released: April 18, 1940
Type: Movie
A man is framed for being a spy. After he is released, he sets out to find who the real spies are.
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The Journey to Tilsit
Title: The Journey to Tilsit
Character: Endrik Settegast
Released: November 2, 1939
Type: Movie
A villager is tempted by a sophisticated city woman and almost kills his wife in a boating accident.
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Der Hampelmann
Title: Der Hampelmann
Character: Peter
Released: October 26, 1938
Type: Movie
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Covered Tracks
Title: Covered Tracks
Character: Bezirksarzt Dr. Morot
Released: August 25, 1938
Type: Movie
Séraphine and her mother arrive in Paris to visit the 1867 World Exhibition. In an overcrowded city they must be accommodated in separate hotels. During the night the mother, who wasn't feeling very well, gets suddenly worse. When next morning Séraphine goes to meet her every trace of her presence has disappeared and everybody denies having ever met her. The bewildered young woman must find someone who believes her. Previous version of So Long at the Fair (1950).
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The Indian Tomb
Title: The Indian Tomb
Character: Chandra, Maharadscha von Eschnapur
Released: January 27, 1938
Type: Movie
After the events of Der Tiger von Eschnapur, Maharadscha Chandra is ready to execute his well-planned vengeance, in which German architect Peter Fürbringer, his fiancée Irene and his assistant will have to fight for their lives amidst a revolt fueled by traitor Prinz Ramigani.
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Waltz Melodies
Title: Waltz Melodies
Character: Hans v. Waldenau
Released: January 20, 1938
Type: Movie
The big revue star Marietta falls in love and gives up the stage career. The theatre stands before the bankruptcy. Only when her husband has convinced himself that she will remain loyal to him, Marietta may go on working. Revue film according to pattern: a lot of music, sturdy situation comic and popular stars.
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The Tiger of Eschnapur
Title: The Tiger of Eschnapur
Character: Maharadscha von Eschnapur
Released: January 6, 1938
Type: Movie
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Rubber
Title: Rubber
Character: Johannes 'John' van Laer
Released: January 4, 1936
Type: Movie
John Van Laer is the overseer of a vast rubber plantation in the Dutch East Indies. His new wife Renee joins him at the plantation, but the monotony of her existence and unbearable heat soon drive her to distraction. One of Van Laer's workmen takes advantage of the boss' absence to seduce Renee.
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The Cross-Patch
Title: The Cross-Patch
Character: Willy van Hergershuizen
Released: August 7, 1935
Type: Movie
Willy, the son of baron Van Hergershuizen, finds himself disinherited after he marries an untitled girl. His wife decides to take action and applies for the job of the baron's housekeeper.
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De Big van het Regiment
Title: De Big van het Regiment
Character: Berkhage
Released: April 19, 1935
Type: Movie
Diary fragments tell of the arrival of Belgian refugees across the Dutch border in winter 1915. Reserve lieutenant Berkhage returns from the Belgian border with a refugee child. Named "Big" by the company the kid soon becomes the regimental darling.
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On the Move
Title: On the Move
Character: George van Reen
Released: January 1, 1935
Type: Movie
Janus Fortuin is a goodhearted piano tuner married to a greedy landlady. Their daughter Polly is engaged to young songwriter George van Reen. When rich uncle Barend from Batavia makes a surprise visit — pretending to be a lodger called 'Van Santen' — the Fortuin family finds their lives turned upside down.
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The Good Hope
Title: The Good Hope
Character: Geert
Released: December 21, 1934
Type: Movie
Fisherman’s widow Kniertje urges her two younger sons to set sail on the ‘Op hoop van zegen’, a heavily insured floating wreck which duly goes down in a storm. Kniertje is left behind, alone and lonely. Based on Herman Heijermans’ socialist-inspired Dutch theatre classic.