The Winslow Boy – 1999 | 104mins | Drama | Colour

Plot Synopsis

Writer/director David Mamet’s skilfully played drawing room drama is based on the true story of a young naval cadet accused of stealing a five shilling postal order. Mamet dissects in clinical fashion the petty social niceties, the British class system and the deceitful language of a lost era. Based on the play by Terence Rattigan, The Winslow Boy was previously filmed in 1948 by Anthony Asquith. Handsomely mounted and faultlessly acted by a superb ensemble cast, Mamet’s uneven depiction of social conventions sadly pays too much respect to the original stage play and lacks the dynamism expected.

In Edwardian London, a schoolboy proclaiming his innocence, Ronnie Winslow (Guy Edwards), is expelled from Osbourne Naval Academy for allegedly stealing a postal order from a fellow cadet’s locker. Arthur (Nigel Hawthorne), the retired father of the upper-middle class Winslow family, risks financial ruin, ill health and public ridicule by challenging the naval academy’s decision to expel their youngest son. After defeat in the military court of appeals, Ronnie’s father goes to Sir Robert Morton (Jeremy Northam), a charismatic barrister and MP, who takes the case before Parliament to seek permission to sue the crown. Arthur’s suffragette daughter, Catherine (Rebecca Pidgeon, aka Mrs Mamet), is initially unhappy with the lengths her obsessive father is prepared to go to and its repercussions on her own disintegrating engagement, but consequently she falls in love with the eligible Morton.