[5] He was taken prisoner by the Germans on 21 March 1918 at the village of Roisel and transported to Le Cateau gaol and then by train to the first of several prisoner-of-war camps, Rastatt, in Baden, Germany.

[6][7] Leaving the cavalry, Loder went into business with a German friend, Walter Becker, establishing a pickle factory in Potsdam.

He appeared at the British Theatre Guild in Berlin and enjoyed success in productions of The Last of Mrs Cheyney, which had opened in London in 1925, and Loyalties.

He had a good part in Madame Wants No Children (1926), directed by Alexander Korda before going on to appear in numerous films in the next two years: The Last Waltz, The White Spider, The Great Unknown, all in 1927; and Alraune, Fair Game, When the Mother and the Daughter, Casanova's Legacy, The Sinner, and Adam and Eve, all released in 1928.

That year he sailed to the United States on the SS Île de France, bound for Hollywood to try his luck in the new medium of "talkies".

He made The Doctor's Secret (1929), Paramount's first talking picture, playing Ruth Chatterton's leading man.

[citation needed] He also appeared in Black Waters (1929), the first British talkie, which was made in the US by producer Herbert Wilcox, and The Unholy Night (1929) at MGM.

Loder pursued Merle Oberon in The Battle (1933) and had the star role in Money for Speed (1933) opposite Ida Lupino.

Loder specialised in leading man parts in Warn London (1934); Java Head (1934) with Anna May Wong; Sing As We Go (1934) with Fields again, and a big hit; My Song Goes Round the World (1934);[11] Lorna Doone (1934), as John Ridd; and 18 Minutes (1935).

He was top billed in The Silent Passenger (1935) and It Happened in Paris (1935) and supported in the Mozart biopic, Whom the Gods Love (1936).

Loder played the heroic investigator in Alfred Hitchcock's Sabotage (1936), replacing Robert Donat[12] before taking on the role of Sir Henry Curtis, the male romantic interest in the 1937 original film version of King Solomon's Mines, romancing Anna Lee.

Loder and Lockwood romanced again in support of a crusty old actor in Owd Bob (1938), before he went to France to appear in Katia (1938) with Danielle Darrieux, in which he played Alexander II of Russia.

At 20th Century Fox he made Tin Pan Alley (1940), Scotland Yard (1941), and How Green Was My Valley (1941), in which he played a brother of Roddy McDowall's character.

Warners gave him a then-rare lead in a B move, The Gorilla Man (1943), The Mysterious Doctor (1943), Murder on the Waterfront (1943), and Adventure in Iraq (1943).

Loder's other wives were Sophie Kabel, Evelyn Auff Mordt, and finally, in 1958, the heiress Alba Julia Lagomarsino of Argentina.

Loder's general health deteriorated in his eighties, and he was admitted in 1982 to the Distressed Gentlefolks Aid Association's Nursing Home in Vicarage Gate, Kensington.

[27] Loder is the focus of the play The Private View: Fairytales of Ireland 1916–2016, written by Trevor White and directed by Gerard Stembridge.