The W Plan is a 1930 British spy film produced and directed by Victor Saville and starring Brian Aherne, Madeleine Carroll, Gibb McLaughlin, and Gordon Harker. The screenplay was written by Saville with Miles Malleson and Frank Launder, based on the novel of the same name by Graham Seton. When the film was released in the United States, Aherne was appearing in The Barretts of Wimpole Street on Broadway, and receiving praise for his performance as Robert Browning. The film was a critical success, but did not do well at the box office.

Plot

Colonel Duncan Grant (Brian Aherne) is a British officer during World War I. When the British high command get wind of a German plan, titled The W Plan, from the lips of a dying German officer, Major Ulrich Muller (George Merritt), they send Grant behind enemy lines to learn the details. After successfully being dropped by airplane near the German town of Essen, where he makes his way to home of the dead German who was responsible for the plan. Grant is chosen because he speaks fluent German, having spent a significant amount of time in Germany prior to outbreak of hostilities. While in Essen, he runs into an old girlfriend, Rose Hartmann (Madeleine Carroll). When he and Rose go to a nearby café, he is approached by German officers and asked for his papers. While he has the documents taken from Muller, the Germans become suspicious, and Grant has to make a quick getaway. Unfortunately, the plane he is supposed to meet with to make his escape is shot down, after which Grant is arrested for desertion.