TimR

I watched it again last week, and fell completely under the spell of the master magicians Powell and Pressuburger.

I do see what you're saying with the Britain/US theme. It really is everywhere. I didn't catch it the first time.

I could have done without Raymond Massey's eye-rolling, nostril-flaring, righteous scoundrel. Surely the Americans might have come up with someone better than that to counter Roger Livesey, one of the most intelligent and sympathetic of actors. But otherwise, I greatly enjoyed it.

TimR

Thank you for posting the photos. It may not be a dog forum, but dogs fit in very nicely here. They are beauties. ANd of course, P.E. Island is, too.

TimR

I would like to know if there is a place to contact regarding the region 1 DVD release. I would be happy to start writing whoever is sitting on their hands.

Steve Crook

I thought Theo (Walbrook) made it clear in his second big speech, the one after Clive's broadcast is cancelled.

Clive: I often thought, a fellow like me dies - special knowledge, all to waste. Well, am I dead? Does my knowledge count for nothing, eh? Experience? Skill? You tell me!
Theo: It is a different knowledge they need now, Clive. The enemy is different, so you have to be different, too.
Clive: Are you mad? I know what war is!
Theo: I don't agree.
Clive: You...!
Theo: I read your broadcast up to the point where you describe the collapse of France. You commented on Nazi methods--foul fighting, bombing refugees, machine-gunning hospitals, lifeboats, lightships, bailed-out pilots--by saying that you despised them, that you would be ashamed to fight on their side and that you would sooner accept defeat than victory if it could only be won by those methods.
Clive: So I would!
Theo: Clive! If you let yourself be defeated by them, just because you are too fair to hit back the same way they hit at you, there won't be any methods but Nazi methods! If you preach the Rules of the Game while they use every foul and filthy trick against you, they will laugh at you! They'll think you're weak, decadent! I thought so myself in 1919!
Theo: [he pats Clive's shoulder] You mustn't mind me, an old alien, saying all this. But who can describe hydrophobia better than one who has been bitten - and is now immune.

Clive: I heard all that in the last war! They fought foul then - and who won it?
Theo: I don't think you won it. We lost it -but you lost something, too. You forgot to learn the moral. Because victory was yours, you failed to learn your lesson twenty years ago and now you have to pay the school fees again. Some of you will learn quicker than the others, some of you will never learn it - because you've been educated to be a gentleman and a sportsman, in peace and in war. But Clive! [tenderly] Dear old Clive - this is not a gentleman's war. This time you're fighting for your very existence against the most devilish idea ever created by a human brain - Nazism. And if you lose, there won't be a return match next year... perhaps not even for a hundred years.


Then Clive goes out and forms the Home Guard (or helps out with it). But it still needs Spud and his platoon to show him what modern warfare is all about.


In reality, Churchill already knew this and had formed the Commando units, Paras and other special forces - and SOE.

The Paras were formed after the German parachute troops attacked and took over Crete. They lost so many men that Hitler decided to never use them again. But Churchill decided that it was worth the losses. So yes, we did do it the Nazi way. Or rather, we learnt from their way of doing it and improved our own methods.

Spud's platoon was part of the regular army, but that was the way they were being trained by then. It was just the generals that needed to catch up

Steve

Steve Crook

It wasn't the only response by any means. Of course most people were grateful for them coming and what they did and were fully aware of the sacrifices made. But there was a murmuring undercurrent from some people and that's what the government asked P&P to address.

Steve

Steve Crook

Well Columbia are the ones with the rights to it. They're now a Sony company.

But really we're waiting for Mr Scorsese to do that commentary.
I mention it to Thelma Schoonmaker every time I see her
And she does assure me that he wants to do it and will do it as soon as he gets time. It's not a case of anyone sitting on their hands but Marty & Thelma are incredibly busy people. not only with the films they make but also with things like the foundation that Marty set up to preserve and restore old films.

Steve

Steve Crook

Isn't that just perfect?

And the normally chatty Bonar Colleano knows he can't add anything so he just stands there for a moment in silence.

Steve

Steve Crook

How could you not fall under their spell?

It does vary with different tastes of course but for me this is just the perfect film. It's got so much in it, romance, philosophy, poetry, history, intelligence, contemplation of life, death and eternity, romance, drama, peril, humour, self-awareness, willingness to fight for and sacrifice for a loved one, and did I mention romance?

Add to all of that the daring of tackling such a subject at such a time, the beautiful way it is filmed, the ideal casting - yes, even Ray Massey. I like the way he starts off being so fierce but he's come round to be on Peter & June's side by the end. When he warns Doc Reeves to take care he is concerned for their safety.

Every time I see it, and I've seen it a lot, it has me in tears. It just hits all the right buttons for me and the tears are just the emotion welling up uncontrollably.

Steve



"She is a nice girl"

TimR

Martin Scorsese and Thelma Schoonmaker are two people I admire and respect - as film makers and for their extraordinary work with P&P films.

I didn't know that was the reason.

TimR

Yes, it is.

TimR

Yes, I loved it.

The warmth and generosity moved me a great deal, as did the story.

I was also pleased with the numerous references to Boston and the inclusion of an aspect of American life that is rarely shown on film - even in American films.

I did find Massey to be too stagey, but I do admit that the sort of righteous, humorless (sometimes self-righteous) allegiance to the letter of the law is a New England trait even today.

I also noticed that Kathlees Byron is very beautiful, like a medieval carving. I didn't think so in Black Narcissus.

Steve Crook

Have you got her other great appearance in a P&P film, The Small Back Room on your list? There she pairs up with David Farrar again in a "British Noir" (if the purists will allow for such a thing).

It's on Criterion's "coming soon" list. They're just finishing it off at the moment.

Kathleen was another one, like Roger Livesey, and David Farrar to an extent, who was mainly a stage actor. Although they all did a reasonable amount of film work their only really outstanding film work is what they did for P&P. Although he was known to bully actors to didn't give it 100%, with some like these he got some amazing performances out of them.

I think Kathleen's only other film role that is really worth seeing is in Prelude to Fame (1950) where she discovers a young musical prodigy and drives him to more than he is really capable of emotionally.

She had some good but small roles in some great films like The Elephant Man and in some truly dire films like Wolfshead: The Legend of Robin Hood.

She played old Mrs Ryan in Saving private Ryan. Spielberg having been brought up on P&P films (amongst many others).

She is now being looked after in Denville Hall (home for retired actors) and is suffering from Alzheimer's Disease

Steve

penfold

How interesting....you're much harder on them than most people who have seen the film...and certainly harder than the contemporary critics..
I would argue at the beginning of the film we see the 'Private Army' as young war-hardened, slightly cynical, thrusting go-getters of precisely the type that are going to win the War for us, and Wynne-Candy and his colleagues as slightly preposterous, and although Spud is rude, he does back away and apologise in mid-flow....and it was only a (War) game. He's not - or not meant, I think - to be seen as the baddie in all this.
It's only after we have got to know Candy/Wynne-Candy through the flashback, fallen a bit in love with him and the ideals of conduct, principles, the Englishness he represents that we feel so less comfortable with the opening sequence, seen from a slightly different viewpoint, literally and metaphorically. And that the dangers of the 'Modern' ways of war, and life, included throwing the baby out with the bathwater. The answer, as seen in the film, I believe, is that the generations mustn't try and dominate each other, but to co-operate; to share experiences and ideas, rather than to either merely repress or supplant them. Hence the invitation to dinner (lunch? I forget).

Me too....but then we have the luxury of (relative) peace. It was harder then, and with more at stake if it all went wrong. There was a very strong debate going on at the time, not entirely behind closed doors, about the prosecution of the war that the film reflects. In a sense, it continues; 'Bomber' Harris is still reviled in some quarters (not by me I hasten to add) for prosecuting the war a little too keenly for some tastes.

Bit of a Bay Window, what??

penfold

Tim, if you haven't seen The Small Back Room, then you only have an inkling of what a truly great actress Kathleen Byron was. And gorgeous....she smoulders - gently, in a very refined way, but smoulders anyway...it's a cracking film, but like Contraband(1940) it's sometimes seen as a minor film.. (Why? is it because it was monochrome?)...but it really isn't. They're both absolute jewels, made on low budgets with clever casts, combining Pressburger's writing with all the economy Powell learnt in his Quota Quickie years, and his silentfilm influences to boot. If you haven't seen them, you should...it's a slightly different P'n'P to the Technicolor epics...but no less interesting.

It's strange, there was a whole raft of powerful British leading ladies that emerged from the films of the War that struggled to make a lasting impact post-War. Was it that the War-era films were more adult, whereas the post-War films were too fluffy for such strong female characters?? Kathleen Byron is a prime example, but how about Valerie Hobson, Joan Greenwood, Lilli Palmer, Patricia Roc (Too sexy by half ??); Wendy Hiller did, but only on stage, not on film.... They all had careers, they all paid their rent...but they never reached the eminence I feel they should have had, the sort that Helen Mirren or Judi Dench (rightly) has now...any other thoughts on why this was??

Bit of a Bay Window, what??

Third Man

Perhaps it was to do with the American influence of films in this country post-war, less British fair. The Americans had no problems getting or giving strong parts to their women especially in the femme fatales of 1940's and 50's Film Noir.

Simon