50 Great War Films: Paths of Glory

The film originated from a book by Thomas Cobb who, in turn, had chosen the title from a line in Thomas Gray's poem Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard (1751): The paths of glory lead but to the grave. It is too glib to say it is an anti-war film; rather, it is an attack on a major component of human nature. Kubrick himself, in a later interview made the point: Man isn't a noble savage, he's an ignoble savage. He is irrational, brutal, weak, silly, unable to be objective about anything where his own interests are involved. The impossibly Selfish Gene?

1957 Poster - directed by Stanley Kubrick

From the first moments of the movie - with its 1916 scenes of Major George Broulard (Adolphe Menjou) entering an opulent chateau (filmed at the Schleissheim Palace near Munich) to talk to his 'old friend' Brigadier General Paul Mireau (George Macready) - one senses there is a likely polemic coming.  George says Paul must order his men to advance on, and capture, the Anthill. Paul refuses, until it is suggested command of the 12th Corps and another Star awaits him if successful. The bribe outweighs any prior feeling for his men. 

The interior of the Chateau - with its Old Masters pictures and its valuable furniture - then cuts to the grim realities of trench warfare. Mireau marches through one trench, with a 'hail fellow well met' attitude until he meets a soldier who will not answer him. The man is shell-shocked, but the General immediately launches into a vituperative attack on him, accusing him of cowardice and stating there was no such thing as shell shock.

Enter Kirk Douglas  (Colonel Drax),commanding officer of the 701st Infantry Regiment.  Accepting the assault was 'pregnable' (!), he also pointed out over half of the French force would be wiped out. Drax sends a three-man reconnaisance team to check the No-Man's Land area. The leader, who had been drinking heavily, not only retreats in fear but lobs a grenade to kill one of the other men whom he had sent further on. Again - the ignoble savage. The following morning, the attack on the Anthill fails, as it was bound to. A furious General Mireau orders his artillery officer to fire on his own men. The officer refuses without written confirmation. To deflect blame, Mireau decides to court martial 100 men for cowardice; Broulard persuades him to cut this down to three. Mireau regards his men  as scum. The whole rotten regiment. A pack of sneaking, whining, tail-dragging curs.

Court Martial of Corporal Paris, Private Ferol and Private Arnaud

The rest of the film details the three men at a court martial (Mireau is portrayed reclining indolently on a divan); Drax, who chooses to defend them, is blindsided on every issue; there is no formal written indictment, there is no stenographer. Drax says to find these men guilty would be a crime to haunt each of you till the day you die. To no avail. The men are accused of being a stain on the flag of France. Drax's appeals to the two generals are also ignored.

Generals Mireau and Broulard

The night before the executions, Dax tells Broulard of Mireau's order to shell his own trenches. Again, seemingly to no avail. The next morning the three men are executed by firing squad.

Execution of Arnaud, Ferol and Paris

Broulard then breakfasts with a gloating Mireau; Drax is also invited and Broulard tells Mireau he will be investigated for the order to fire on his own men. The latter storms off.  Broulard then offers Drax the vacant position! Drax refuses and calls him a degenerate, sadistic old man. The film ends when Drax pauses to listen in to his men carousing in a nearby bar. A German girl sings a sentimental folk song to them - there are close-ups of many of the men shedding tears. Drax leaves, not telling them they are to return to the Front.

2017 DVD edition

Amazingly, Kirk Douglas was still alive when the above DVD was issued. He died, aged 103, in February 2020. It was thanks to him that the film got made. He managed to get an advance for $1 million from United Artists - more than a third was allocated to his salary! Kubrick wanted the film to end happily, with the men being reprieved; Douglas demanded they stick to the original ending. Around 600 German police officers were used as extras, the film being shot entirely in Bavaria. The only female in the film, the German actress Christiane Harlan who sang the song, later married Kubrick and was his wife until his death in 1999.

The Music - or, sometimes, complete lack of it - played an important role in the film's success. The strains of La Marseillaise at the start, heralding Broulard's arrival at the chateau; the use of military drumming; the absolute silence when the three soldiers engage in the reconnaisance; the song at the end; all are very effective. The film's targets are clearly the officer class - and the church (?) Father Dupré's ineffective comment We do not question the will of God, my son borders on the mind-boggling.

The film was premiered in Munich on 1st November 1957. It was, inevitably, criticised heavily by the French military, active and retired. It was not shown in France until 1975. It was also banned in all USA military bases, both at home and abroad. To my mind, it did show up the seamier sides of war, but main at the expense of the top-brass: Lions led by Donkeys, and the donkeys were bound to dislike its screening.

Scott's 'The Antiquary' revisited

 

The dirty bare-footed chambermaid Jenny Rintherout 

caught dusting Monkbarn's sanctum sanctorum

I bought the three volume first edition on 9th February 2003, for £69. This is the second of Walter Scott's novels I am re-reading within a year. I have just read through what I wrote about The Antiquary in my Blog of 1st May 2020. It is very positive. Therefore, it is interesting that whereas I enjoyed the re-read of Guy Mannering even more, I was not quite so impressed with The Antiquary this time. I am still trying to puzzle out quite why. I quote Lockhart again, when he said it was Scott's favourite among his works. So, what was the problem? The clue is possibly in Scott's opening Advertisement. He writes: I have been more solicitous to describe manners minutely, than to arrange in any case an artificial and combined narration... I still appreciated Monkbarns' description and history of his various acquisitions to Lovel and his comeuppance by Edie Ochiltree at the Kairn of Kinprunes; but on more than one occasion I just wished he would zip-it! Moreover, the too regular use of Latin begins to irritate a 21st century reader far more than it probably did an early 19th century one. The reader begins to empathise with Hector 'Hotspur' M'Intyre's approach to Monkbarns' long-windedness. Nevertheless, the scene where he asks his womenkind for his sword to fight the French invasion is excellent.

Monkbarns, sword and the womenkind

Rather like Dirk Hatterick's 'Dutch' in Guy Mannering, Dousterswivel's  'German' pronunciation as conveyed by Scott also grates after a time. Lovel is still rather dull; as he himself admits, I ask nothing of society but the permission of walking innoxiously through the path of life without jostling others. Not the stuff for a hero in a novel.

On the other hand, I again relished the little character cameos, such as the fat, gouty, pursy landlord of the Hawes Inn negotiating with Monkbarns the refreshments to be served; and Miss Grizzy and Maria M'Intyre, whom Monkbarns had trained to consider him as the greatest man upon earth, and whom he used to boast of as the only women he had ever seen who were well broke-in and bitted to obedience. Monkbarns introduces them to Lovel  as his malae bestiae. And there is always Edie, with his exterior appearance of a mendicant. - A slouched hat of huge dimensions; a long white beard, which mingled with his grizzled hair; an aged, but strongly marked and expressive countenance, hardened by climate and exposure, to a right brick-dust complexion... a privileged nuisance!  Monkbarns tells Lord Glenallan, Edie is to a certain extent, the oracle of the district through which he travels - their genealogist, their newsman, their master of the revels, their doctor at a pinch, or their divine...

Edie Ochiltree watches Dousterswivel

dig for buried treasure

The rocky relationship between Monkbarns and Sir Arthur Wardour doesn't pall - there was a spirit of mutual accommodation upon the whole, and they dragged on like dogs in couples, with some difficulty and occasional snarling, but without absolutely coming to  a stand-still or throttling each other. I think I also appreciated old Caxon more this time, wig protector extraordinaire: "God's sake, haud a care! - Sir Arthur's drowned already, and ye fa' ower the cleugh too, there will be but ae wig left in the parish, and that's the minister's."  Monkbarn remarks: The wigs were like the three degrees of comparison - Sir Arthur's ramilies being the positive, his own bob-wig the comparative, and the overwhelming grizzle of the worthy clergyman figuring as the superlative. Lord Glenallan also figured more in my consciousness this time; as did Baillie Littlejohn, who, contrary to what his name expressed, was a tall portly magistrate, on whom corporation crusts had not been conferred in vain. The Mucklebackets also provide both light relief and pathos. 

Luckie Mucklebacket and Monkbarns

So, whereas Guy Mannering certainly retains its B++, or even an A/B, on its second reading; The Antiquary slips very slightly, from a B++ to a B+.  John Buchan says the plot is elaborate, artificial, and unimportant...the construction is careless... but it is primarily a comedy of Scottish country life and the book is richer than any of the others in cunning detail...I still enjoyed re-reading both of them.

50 Great War Films: The Bridge on the River Kwai

 

1957 Poster - Directed by David Lean

By now, David Lean was really getting into his stride as a Film Director. The opening shots of this prisoner of war drama are a series of compelling images: a bird of prey circles in the sky; the camera then shows impenetrable thick jungle a long way below; then it changes to rows of recently dug graves, with primitive wooden crosses; then to the emaciated and exhausted PoWs working at the end of a train line. The viewer then sees a line of British prisoners marching into a jungle camp, to the background of the famous 'Colonel Bogey March'. They line up in front of the Japanese prison commander, Colonel Saito (Sessue Hayakawa).

Alec Guinness as Lieut.-Col. Nicholson

The British meet up with Commander Shears of the US Navy (William Holden), who describes the appalling conditions in the camp. Colonel Nicholson (Alec Guinness) not only forbids all escape attempts because they were ordered in Singapore to surrender, but also refuses to instruct his officers to do manual labour. For this, he is put in a solitary 'cooler' (after being beaten) and his officers herded into another. Meanwhile, Shears and two others do escape, but only the former manages to get through to a Siamese village; he subsequently is given a river craft by them and ends up in Ceylon. 

The British engage in every ploy to slow down/sabotage the construction of the railway bridge; Saito uses the excuse of the anniversary of Japan's 1905 victory over Russia to grant a general amnesty. The released Nicholson, shocked at the poor quality of workmanship on the bridge, persuades Saito to let him and his officers take over. The bridge, moved to a more sensible section of the river, is completed on time. However! a British officer, Major Warden (Jack Hawkins), in Ceylon persuades a very reluctant Shears (who has impersonated a dead US officer all along) to join two others in a trek (after being dropped by parachute) to destroy the bridge. There followed many shots of them bashing their way through the jungle, with Siamese girl coolies carrying the detonation materials. 

Nicholson and Saito trace the line to the detonator

Excitement mounts: will the saboteurs manage to fixes the explosives under the bridge in time; will anyone see the fuse wire when the river level unaccountably drops? yes and yes. It is Nicholson who realises something is suspicious. The climax is Saito, who is following him to find the detonator, gets shot, as does Lieut. Joyce, i/c detonation; then Holden is killed, finally Guinness dies (both by a mortar shot by Hawkins from the heights above), but not until he has fallen across the plunger, thereby detonating the bridge, with the train plunging into the river. Moreover, Guinness just has time to cry out What have I done? The film ends with the PoW's British doctor Clipton shaking his head, saying  Madness!..Madness!

The movie was a great commercial success, being the highest grossing film of 1957 in the USA and Canada; it was the most popular film at the British Box Office. It won 7 Oscars in that year: including Best Picture; Best Director (Lean); Best Actor (Guinness). Guinness said he based his unsteady walk from the cooler on his 11 year-old son, who was then recovering from polio.

There are some memorable scenes: Saito shouting - This is War. This is not a game of cricket. And later, I hate the British. (jabbing his knife into the table). You are defeated but you have no shame. You are stubborn but have no pride. You endure but you have no courage. I hate the British. When Holden is delirious, he appears to see a bird of prey hovering over (and for) him - in fact, it is a colourful kite flown by village children, who are his rescuers. Guinness, released, goes out to his cheering men; the camera then focuses on Saito weeping in his room. The entertainment, with PoWs, inevitably dressed as damsels, went down well, too.

The brief romantic entanglement of Holden in Ceylon (which Lean himself disliked, calling it a very terrible scene) and the flirtation with the coolies didn't work for me. I suppose you couldn't have had long, drawn-out filming just of the bridge being built, but the shots of the jungle saboteurs went on a bit too long. Guinness and James Donald (Major Clipton, the PoW doctor) both thought the film was anti-British. Some Japanese views disliked the depiction of the Japanese characters - that's a surprise! In fact, some 13,000 captured servicemen died working on the Death Railway in far worse conditions than those shown in the movie. I assume the USA liked it due to the presence of William Holden.

Outer Sleeve and Inner Casing - 1985 DVD

50 Great War Films: The Dam Busters

 

1954 Poster - Directed by Michael Anderson

The music composed by Eric Coates - The Dam Busters March - got the film off to a splendid start in one's Memory Box. The plotline is quite straightforward: in early 1942 aeronautical engineer Barnes Wallis is working on a scheme, with plenty of misses, to make practical his theory of a bouncing bomb which would skip over water to clear any torpedo netting below the surface. Once hitting the dam, the backspin would make it sink but keeping it in contact with the wall. Finding the Ministry too cautious and obstructive, Wallis takes his idea straight to Sir Arthur 'Bomber' Harris, head of RAF Bomber Command. Harris is eventually convinced and gets Churchill's support. Wallis continues to react to the various failures, both on the Chesil beach area and in a huge water tank.

Success at last for Gibson and Barnes Wallis

A special group of Lancaster bombers, 617 Squadron, is set up, under the command of Wing Commander Guy Gibson. Experienced crews are gathered together; they practise and practise low-flying over Derwent Water; by the time of the raid they find they need to be at 60' - not 150' - above the water. Only at the last briefing do the crews learn the targets: the three dams - the Mohne, the Eder and the Sorpe - which supply the vital Ruhr industrial area. Together, they hold 400 million tons of water and should devastate German production. 

         

      Gibson (Richard Todd) at the controls                         The breached Dam

The raids go ahead; as they cross over the Dutch coast one hears Enemy coast ahead. Gibson leads the first run on the Mohne Dam; the code word "Goner" comes through by Morse Code to the Ops. Room back in England; three more times this occurs - the bombs have exploded against the Dam, but failed to breach it. 'Zebra' flight actually crashes into a nearby hill. Then, on the 5th run, 'N-Nats' succeeds. Off Gibson goes to supervise another success at the Eder Dam. The final scene shows some Lancasters returning; Gibson meets up with Harris to discuss success but at what a cost. Gibson walks off into the distance.

The acting was  never less than competent. Michael Redgrave portrayed Barnes Wallis as tirelessly dedicated to his project (the real man was, apparently, an obsessive); Richard Todd, as in most of his films, had little charisma due to a certain 'woodenness' in his performance; the supporting cast did their jobs, such as Basil Sydney as Air Chief Marshal Sir Arthur Harris and Raymond Huntley as the National Physical Laboratory Official. R.C. Sherriff wrote the screenplay; an Edwin Hillier was Director of Photography! The flight sequences were shot using real Avro Lancaster bombers supplied by the RAF. The Upper Derwent valley (the test area for the real raids) doubled as the Ruhr valley. Additional footage was shot above Lake Windermere.

The film was premiered on 16 May 1955 at the Odeon in Leicester Square, the 12th anniversary of the Raid. The surviving members of the 617 Squadron were among the guests. The movie was the most successful film at the British Box Office in 1915 (and, guess what, did poorly in the USA). The British Film Institute placed it as the 68th greatest British film. There are certainly some compelling scenes - the crews 'relaxing' on their beds before the raid; again relaxing outside on the grass by the runway, playing chess and cards; the close-ups of faces in the cockpits; the dancing girls in the London theatre; the poultry famer composing his angry letter to the Ministry about the noise of the low-flying aircraft upsetting his hens' egg-laying; Barnes Wallis's hunched shoulders showing his tension.

Max Hastings wrote an article in September 2019, headed Exploding the Dambusters Myth. I feared another revisionist piece. However. although he makes it clear Guy Gibson was not a likeable hero (in 1977 a Gunner who had been on the raid said He was the sort of little bugger who was always jumping out from behind a hut to tell you your buttons were undone); he makes valid points about fact that the raid killed up to 1,400 people, almost all women and not Nazis, drowned in what must have felt like a Biblical flood - the Mohnekatastrophe. Of the 19 aircraft which took off between 9.30 p.m. and midnight on 16th May, Gibson personally led 9 Lancasters; 5 were despatched to the Sorpe, with 5 intended as reserves. One pilot caught the water and limped back; two more hit power cables and crashed, killing the crew; another was dazzled by a searchlight which caused it to hit the ground; two more aborted; 8 actually reached the Mohne. Only 77 crew of the 133 who had taken off returned to RAF Scampton safely. Moreover, only 32 survived the War; Gibson himself was shot down and killed over Holland on 19th September 1944.

Of course, there has been (increasingly so in this febrile, politically correct world) concern over the name of Guy Gibson's black labrador - Nigger. A long-time and close companion of Gibson, he was a great favourite of both 106 and 617 Squadrons. The film captures this, with repeated name-calls.  It also shows the dog's liking for beer and, sadly, his death (off screen) by a vehicle. The dog's name was also used as a single codeword whose transmission told of the breach of the Mohne Dam. There is the poignant moment, when Gibson holds the dead dog's lead, before casting it into the waste bin. The DVD, thank goodness, retained the name. In 2012 writer James Holland found that the three characters connected with the raid that most people remembered were Guy Gibson, Barnes Wallis and Nigger! Some edited American versions changed it to Trigger. Apparently, Gibson used to call the dog Nigsy occasionally. Perhaps that compromise might satisfy the no-platforming crowd. Somehow, I doubt it.

The 2015 DVD.

50 Great War Films: The Cruel Sea

 

1953 Movie poster - Directed by Charles Frend

With The Cruel Sea (1953), we are back in the watery territory of In Which We Serve (1942), only this time we are on a newly-built Flower-class Corvette and not a Destroyer. Jack Hawkins (Lieutenant-Commander George Ericson) begins the movie with a voice over: This is a story of the Battle of the Atlantic, the story of an ocean, two ships, and a handful of men. The men are the heroes; the heroines are the ships. The only villain is the sea, the cruel sea, that man has made more cruel... Hawkins is well-cast in his role, showing determination and grit and other qualities of leadership, but also the sensitivity (in one shot he sheds tears) to empathise with his crew and their travails. One scene shows him getting drunk and collapsing on a chair in his cabin. Another sees him having flash-backs when abandoning the Compass Rose, as he stands on the bridge of his new ship. As he later remarks: You knew how to keep watch on filthy nights, and how to go without sleep, how to bury the dead, and how to die without wasting anyone's time.

Hawkins and his officers on Compass Rose

He is ably supported by other crew members: Donald Sinden as Sub-Lieutenant Keith Lockhart, who later agrees to serve under Hawkins in their new ship, rather than have a command of his own. A major plus of the DVD, is a wonderfully amusing interview with Sir Donald Sinden, reminiscing about the making of the film and giving away several trade secrets! He couldn't swim, so he lay on top of a stunt man swimming below the water! As an aside, I was privileged to watch Sinden in his award-winning portrayal of Lord Foppington in Vanbrugh's The Relapse in 1967 at the Aldwych, London. One of the best theatre experiences I have ever had. Denholm Elliott, a star amongst supporting actors, (New York Times), was good as Sub-Lieutenant John Morell, having to cope with an errant showgirl wife (when Morrell dies after the ship's sinking, Commander Ericson visits the widow, to find her cavorting with another man!); Virginia McKenna (Denholm's wife for in 1954) was an appealing ingénue in just her third film; only Stanley Baker, seemed too much of a caricature martinet - but, once a second-hand car salesman, he swiftly departed through an 'illness' suggested to him by the other officers; it was very pleasing to see an old favourite of mine Andrew Cruickshank  (remember Dr. Cameron in the Dr. Findlay TV series!) as the ship's doctor.

HMS Coreopsis (K32) playing the Compass Rose (K49)

Although in five years, Commander Erickson only managed to sink two U-boats, the action scenes were vivid and the moment when he has to steam over swimming survivors to drop depth charges on a U-boat hiding beneath them, is genuinely moving. A crew member shouts out bloody murderer at him. He is later supported by three captains, whom he has rescued, when they meet up in Gibraltar. It is war, but there will be thoughts...and for thoughts there is gin. One captain assures him: No one murdered them. It's the War. The Compass Rose supported 11 convoys in its first year, travelled 98,000 miles overall, and all too often watched merchant ships being blown apart. It was like a stain spreading over the sea. The occasion when the Compass Rose has to stop for repairs is also gripping - showing close-ups of the crew's faces when, ordered to be silent, the noise of the repairers' banging sounds ultra loudly. 

Sinden describes in his reminiscences the ship regularly sailing out into the Channel for the shooting of the film. Other locations used were Plymouth Naval Dockyard and Portland Harbour. Only the interior scenes where shot at the Ealing studios AND, of course, the huge open-air water tank at Denham Studios (shades of In Which We Serve). It was an acre in size, ten-foot deep with two enormous wave-making machines. As with the latter film, it was obvious they were no longer in the open sea!

Ericson gets a new ship - a Castle-class frigate, HMS Saltash Castle  (in reality HMS Portchester Castle) on the terrifying route to and from Murmansk - the filming was so realistic of the sheer horror of it all. A propos of my previous Blog, I now strike the Navy off my list! It will be between the RAF and Army, if I had to join up. 

There are some good bits of dialogue: When you lose a ship, it's like losing a bit of yourself; and, when some enemy sailors climb aboard, They don't look very different from us, do they?; Lockhart, saying of his relationship with Ericson: we're rather like David and Jonathan. 

The movie was the most successful film at the British Box Office in 1953; Jack Hawkins was voted the most popular star with British audiences. Typically, like most British war movies of the time, it performed poorly in the USA. Pathetic. The myopia of films needing John Wayne etc as the hero. This was a far better, more deeply felt movie than Sands of Iwo Jima. Sir Michael Balcon was asked what had been his greatest achievement during his regime, he replied: I think perhaps The Cruel Sea, because when we saw that for the first time, we realised that we really had brought it off. It seemed to just gel and be absolutely right. Simon Heffer, in The Daily Telegraph of May 2020, wrote it is simply the greatest war film ever made. The screenplay was by Eric Ambler.

The 2015 DVD 

Scott's 'Guy Mannering' revisited

 

Meg Merrilees at the Kaim of Derncleugh

I purchased the three volume first edition on 16th August 2019 for £85. I see that my previous Blog on Walter Scott's Guy Mannering was written on 13th February 2020 - nearly a year ago! After this second reading, I can recommend a return to most of his novels. Knowing the story did not affect me adversely at all; rather, I was able to look 'deeper' into the various characters. Above all, there is the outlandish Meg, re-appearing whenever necessary to help right the past wrong done to the Bertram family.

Scott is at his best in describing characters, with plot lines trailing behind. One also feels he is more interested in the gypsy and smuggler class, and eccentrics like lawyer Pleydell and farmer Dandie Dimont than the more 'normal' (dare one say 'boring') heroes and heroines.

Guy Mannering is merely described, in later years, as a handsome tall thin figure, dressed in black, as appeared when he laid aside his riding coat; his age might be between forty and fifty; his cast of features grave and interesting, and his air somewhat military. Every point of his appearance and address bespoke the gentleman. His daughter writes to her friend: His eyes are rather naturally light in character, but agitation or anger gives them a darker and more fiery glance...

Godfrey Bertram, of Ellangowan, succeeded to a long pedigree and a short rent-roll...was one of those second-rate sort of persons, that are to be found frequently in rural situations...a good humoured listless of countenance formed the only remarkable expression of his features...his physiognomy indicated the inanity of character which pervaded his life...

The dying Godfrey Bertram with daughter Lucy

Charles Hazlewood and Dominie Sampson 

Dominie Abel Sampson was of low birth, but having evinced, even from his cradle, an uncommon seriousness of disposition, [his] poor parents were encouraged to hope that their bairn, as they expressed it, "might wag his pow in a pulpit"...his tall ungainly figure, his taciturn and grave manners, and some grotesque habits of swinging his limbs, and screwing his visage while reciting his task, made poor Sampson the ridicule of all his school-companions...the long sallow visage, the goggle eyes, the huge under-jaw, which appeared not to open and shut by an act of volition, but to be dropped and hoisted up again by some complicated machinery within the inner man, the harsh and dissonant voice, and the screech-owl notes... and so on. He is there, real, in front of our eyes! The description of his delight, when asked to arrange Guy Mannering's Library (the late bishop's) is Scott at his best. Julia describes his attending a meal: he pronounces a grace that sounds like the scream of the man in the square that used to cry mackerel, flings his meat down his throat by shovelfuls, like a person loading a cart... Normally, if he utters half a sentence, his jaws would have ached for a month under the unusual fatigue of such a continued exercise.

Meg Merrilies was full six feet high, wore a man's great coat over the rest of her dress, had in her hand a goodly slow-thorn cudgel, and in all points of equipment, except her petticoats, seemed rather masculine than feminine. Her dark elf-locks shot out like the snakes of a gorgon...while her eye had a wild roll that indicated something like real or affected insanity.

Dandie Dinmont of Charlies-Hope, Liddesdale, engages one's attention from the first...a tall, stout, country-looking man, in a large jockey great-coat talking about his dogs: there's auld Pepper and auld Mustard, and young Pepper and young Mustard, and little Pepper and little Mustard... It is clear he is a favourite of the author. After being attacked by ruffians, he says, Hout, tout, man - I would never be making a hum-dudgeon about a scart on the pow...

I commented on the lawyer Pleydell - the lively sharp-looking gentleman -  and the reading of Margaret Bertram's will (again a Scott classic), in my last Blog. Suffice it to say, he was just as amusing in the re-reading.

Lawyer Pleydell presiding at Clerihugh's Tavern, Edinburgh

Then there are the two humorous little cameos of the jailer Mac-Guffog - a stout bandy-legged fellow, with a neck like a bull, a face like a fire-brand, and a most portentous squint of the left eye; and his wife - an awful spectacle [whose] growling voice of this amazon, which rivalled in harshness the crashing music of her own bolts and bars...

Other characters are not really as interesting.

'Vanbeest Brown'/ Henry Bertram's form was tall, manly, and active, and his features corresponded with his person; for, although far from regular, they had an expression of intelligence and good humour, and when he spoke, or was particularly animated, might be decidedly pronounced interesting.

Julia Mannering was of the middle size, or rather less, but formed with much elegance; piercing dark eyes, and jet-black hair of great length, corresponded with the vivacity and intelligence of features, in which were blended a little haughtiness, and a little bashfulness, a great deal of shrewdness, and some power of humorous sarcasm. Her character, mainly surmised through her letters to her confidante Matilda, is a little bland, but she is clearly capable of romantic feelings for 'Brown' even if she remains a dutiful daughter. Scott suggests the letters throw light upon natural good sense, principle, and feelings, blemished by an imperfect education. 

There is very little to say about Charles Hazlewood and Lucy Bertram

Meg Merrilees orders Henry Bertram to follow her

as Lucy Bertram, Julia Mannering and Dandie Dinmont look on

Chapter XIV in the final Volume is well  done, where Meg Merrilees leads Henry Bertram and Dandie Dinmont (followed by Charles Hazlewood) to the cave where Dirk Hatterick is hiding; as are the subsequent death of Merrilees and the end of Glossin, strangled in prison by Hatterick.

Dirk Hatterick accosted by Meg Merrilees in the Cave

50 Great War Films: Sands of Iwo Jima

 

1949 Poster - Director Allan Dwan

This was the first movie in this series of 50 to disappoint, if only slightly. I wonder if it would have been better in colour; or, if I was an American, I would have subscribed to it more fully. As usual, it seems, the film pays a tribute at the start: To the U.S. Marine Corps, whose exploits and valour have left a lasting impression on the world and in the hearts of their countrymen. No one doubts their valour  for a minute, but the the mixing of close-ups with long-shots in the two battle scenes didn't quite work for me.  Perhaps it was because all the marines looked roughly the same once they had their helmets on; but I thought most of the characters were relatively superficial, almost caricatures - the wise-cracker, the extremely youthful one, the sentimentalist, the morbid character. 

Of course, towering above most of them was Sergeant John M. Stryker (John Wayne); in one shot of the Marines moving, his face was superimposed above them. One Marine says Striker knows his business; but the response is classic, So did Jack the Ripper.

Sergeant Stryker (John Wayne) with his men

Stryker is an extra hard product from a hard school; thus he is clearly the right man to get the Marines thoroughly prepared for what lay ahead. After Guadalcanal, a stop in New Zealand, and the intense training, they are about ready. Stryker does have his demons (his wife has left him and he desperately wants a letter from his ten year-old son), which he tries to purge by regularly getting drunk. He does have a heart, beneath that Wayne-inspired character: on leave, he helps a single mother, giving her money for her baby. His initial relationship with some of the men is poor: despised by 'Pete' Conway (John Agar), a college-education son of Colonel Sam Conway, a man whom Stryker admired; and blamed by Al Thomas (Forrest Tucker), for a previous demotion. However, both men end up admiring him.

These, rather basic, storylines have to jostle with two assaults on Japanese islands - Tarawa and Iwo Jima. The battle landings (spliced with real war footage) are, I suppose inevitably, very similar to watch. Ships pounding the shores; aircraft bombing; various pyrotechnics; landing craft full of men with determined and/or frightened faces; the scramble ashore; men being killed; close-ups of mates hiding together in 'fox holes'; and so on. One problem is that you know Wayne did not actually fight in the real War - but at least his character dies at the moment of success. On his body is an unfinished letter he was writing to his son.

There very little room for any humour. Wayne showing a marine how to bayonet fight, through dancing to a tune; the flirtations at a dance. The two moments I recall are actually 'black' humour: a marine, mortally wounded, has time to say to the camera I will get a good night's sleep tonight; and Wayne himself, just before being shot, remarking that he'd never felt better.

So, not a dud, but not a gripping film either.

The 2011 DVD

50 Great War Films: Twelve O'Clock High

 Although this is only my eighth War Film on the list, I have already realised I am thoroughly enjoying each picture. The stories are not just about War, but about the human condition. This movie, Twelve O'Clock High, is about the collapse of morale in a USA Army Air Force daylight precision bombing group. The trauma of lives being not only on the edge, but of falling off it, is powerfully conveyed. The film focuses more on the human element than the machinery of war or the actual aircraft. The opening title screen makes the position clear from the outset: These were the only Americans fighting in Europe in the Fall of 1942. They stood alone against the enemy (well, with the British, The Poles &c. &c.!)  and against doubts from home and abroad.

1949 Movie poster - directed by Henry King

The opening sequence is effective. Former USAAF Major Harvey Stovall sees a Toby Jug in the window of a London antique shop. Ignoring the trader's comments that it is worth very little, he buys it. Boxed up and perched in the front pannier of his bicycle, the Jug goes with Harvey on a nostalgic ride to Archbury airfield, where he served in the War. He reminiscences on the weed-covered, deserted runway; the camera pans skyward; it returns to 1942. Sure enough, the same Toby Jug is perched at the front of the flyers' meeting room. It is turned face to front whenever there is a meeting. Thanks to Harvey's character (well played throughout the film by Dean Jagger, who won a Best Actor in a Supporting Role  Oscar), it is a genuinely felt cameo.

The cut back to 1942 shows the bomber crews returning from a Mission; one plane crash lands (A B-17G bomber was actually crashed for the film by a stuntman!). The crew climb out traumatised by their experience (a co-pilot had had the back of his head shot off). Back in the Mess, a Lord Haw Haw broadcast further demoralises them as he taunts the Americans. No wonder, the following day 28 crewmen ask to be excused from their next raid. The Group Commander, Keith Davenport (Gary Merrill) is also part of the problem. He has got too close to his men and shows similar war-weariness. He is relieved of his post and in stalks Brigadier General Frank Savage - none other than no-nonsense Gregory Peck.

Dean Jagger and Gregory Peck

He wasn't the first choice: Clark Gable, John Wayne, Burt Lancaster, James Cagney, Dana Andrews, Van Heflin and others were considered. Peck I have watched in Hitchcock films and he can come across as a trifle 'wooden'. However, he is just right for this part. After a very rocky start with the men - early on he has a separate aircraft for those who have let the side down. On its side it has lettered 'Leper Colony' - he pulls them through (he piloted that same plane on a mission), but at great cost to his own well-being and stamina. The film ends with Peck lying exhausted on his bed, preparatory to a deep sleep. He had suffered mental exhaustion and simply could not get into his plane and then sat staring blankly into space in his room. Only when he heard the noise of the planes returning, with information about their success, did he start to get up again.

Peck and his crew in the cockpit

The support acting was also good and quite believable, showing how the various crew respond in different ways to the sheer horror of aerial combat and loss of their mates. How much can a man take?, says the Medical Officer at one point. The aerial battle scenes looked very real; and that's because they were! They were edited from actual combat footage from the USAAF and the Luftwaffe. Here was the reality of daylight bombing without fighter escort - only later did long-range fighter aircraft like the P-51 Mustang arrive to help.

The term "Twelve O'Clock High" refers to the practice of calling out the positions of attacking enemy aircraft by reference to an imaginary clock face, with the bomber at the centre. Thus, the phrase meant an attacker was approaching from directly ahead and above.

I have now watched war films depicting life and fighting in the three main Services - the Army, Navy and Air Force. I have often wondered, if I had had the choice, which would I have volunteered for? I think I might have a clearer idea once I have watched all 50 films!

The 2012 DVD edition

50 Great War Films: The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp

 

Directed by Michael Powell & Emeric Pressburger 1943

For the first five minutes or so, I wondered what sort of film this was - it appeared to border on slapstick (which I hate!). Lieut. 'Spud' Wilson leads a group of Home Guard soldiers (named 'Stuffy' etc; a serving girl is named 'Pebble') on a training exercise, set up by his commander Major-General Clive Wynne-Candy (Roger Livesey), to capture London. The 'joke' is that, although it was timed for midnight, 'Spud' strikes pre-emptively at 6.00 p.m. They catch Candy unawares in a Turkish Bath with other elderly officers. It ends in a scuffle, when 'Spud' and Candy fall into a bathing pool. So far, so bad! However, in what is the first of several 'flashbacks', the real point of the film begins. From then on, it gains depth and sincerity, without losing its sense of humour.

We are transported back to 1902. Emerging from the same Bath, the then Lieut. 'Sugar' Candy V.C. is on leave from the Boer War. He receives a letter from Edith Hunter (Deborah Kerr), who is working in Berlin. A German named Kaunitz is spreading anti-British propaganda; she fails to get the British Embassy to intervene; then Candy's fails with his superiors in London, but he sets off for Berlin anyway. Candy and Edith visit a café, where, confronting Kaunitz, the scene ends not only in a personal brawl but an insult to the Imperial German Army officer corps. A duel is forced on Candy; his opponent, drawn by lot, is Theo Kretschmar-Schuldorff  (Anton Walbrook). They fight with sabres; both are wounded, but become friends in the same hospital. Edith has visited regularly and gets engaged to Theo. It is clear, however, that Candy and Edith love each other.

22 year-old Deborah Kerr - another flame-haired beauty!

The flashback now moves to November 1918 and the dying days of the Great War. Candy thinks the Allies gain their victory because 'right is might'. As an aside, actual fighting scenes, apart from the duel, do not exist (we never see Candy actually in any war-conflict himself) and the backcloth for the 'Front' is unconvincing. Driven to a convent for refreshment, he is confronted by rows of nurses, including one who is the spitting-image of Edith - Barbara Wynne (Deborah Kerr again!). He finds her later, by tracking down the Yorkshire nurses in their home county (a brilliant cameo piece by Felix Aylmer at Barbara's parents' lunch table) and marries her, despite their 20-year age difference. In July 1919, Candy finds Theo in a PoW camp, but the latter refuses to acknowledge him. A little later, just before Theo embarks for Germany, Theo rings Candy to apologise and they meet up. Another strong scene is his behaviour around the dinner table, surrounded by officers and other high-ranking Englishmen. Barbara dies in Jamaica, on one of the Candys' many holidays, in 1926. Candy retires in 1935.

We fast-forward to November 1939. Theo has come to England (Edith has also died; his two sons are confirmed Nazis) to seek permanent residence. Candy vouches for him and also reveals he, too, loved Edith - he shows Theo a beautiful full-length oil painting of Barbara/Edith in his trophy room. Theo understands. Candy, restored to the active list, is to give a talk at the BBC regarding the Dunkirk retreat. It is cancelled, as his script says he would rather lose the war than fight like the Nazis. Candy is again retired. Theo urges Candy to build up the Home Guard - he is supported by Angela 'Johnny' Cannon (Deborah Kerr yet again!), who is Candy's driver and who is another spitting-image of Edith. 

Theo, Candy and Angela

Candy's house has been bombed in the Blitz so he moves to his Club. He is relaxing in a Turkish Bath when...the viewer is transported 'back' to the first scene in the movie. Aha! now we understand why Angela, 'Mata Hari', races off and hides under a desk etc. The final scene is again outside Candy's bombed house and the neighbouring park. As the Home Guard troops march by, he takes the Salute. Far from hating it, I had thoroughly enjoyed the film.

There are some delicious touches of humour: the orchestra in the German café, with its splendidly histrionic conductor, playing first for Candy then for Kaunitz; the Prussian-stylised setting for the duel and the weighing of the sabres; the very playful and apt music for such scenes - taking the micky out of the 'Prussian' marching sequences; the justly-praised camerawork as it moves across Candy's wall plastered with the heads of shot wild animals and their dates (very politically-incorrect these days) which ends 'Hun - Flanders'; the capture of eleven umbrellas from the Germans...

A serious message underlines everything, epitomised in two speeches, one by Barbara: I was thinking how odd they [Germans] are. Queer. For years and years, they're writing and dreaming beautiful music and beautiful poetry. All of a sudden they start a war. They sink undefended ships, shoot innocent hostages and bomb and destroy whole streets in London, killing little children. And then they sit down in the same butcher's uniform, and listen to Mendelssohn and Schubert. There's something horrid about that.  The other by Theo, when he is requesting asylum in England from Nazi Germany, which talks about his love for England and his hatred of the Nazis. (Terrific acting by Walbrook)

The Tapestry-look to the title of the Film

One could argue that the movie poked fun at the British heritage - the camera pulling up and back from the duel to the almost fairy-tale, snow scene outside; the chivalric and monocled world of yesteryear; the old-fashioned approach of Candy to honour and decency; the very title page of the film (see above). Moreover,  the portrayal of a sympathetic German might not have been to everyone's taste in 1943, but the film was very clear on the evils of Nazism. Churchill disliked the project - some, including him, thought it might be a self-portrait - so a genius of publicity was to advertise: See the Banned Film!

Originally Candy was to be played by Laurence Olivier (who could not be released from the Fleet Air Arm); and Wendy Hiller for the triple female role. She was, however, pregnant! Roger Livesey was an ideal choice, with the make-up department doing a brilliant job. Deborah Kerr (who had an affair with Michael Powell the director during the filming) also put in a great performance. A young, black-haired John Laurie gave a winning portrayal of Murdoch, Candy's WWI driver and later butler.

37 year-old Livesey and 47 year-old Walbrook

The film was the third most popular movie at the British Box Office in 1943 (after In Which We Serve and Casablanca). It was not released in the USA until 1945, due to the British government's disapproval.

The DVD edition

50 Great War Films: Mrs. Miniver

Greer Garson

Greer Garson, not surprisingly, pleaded more than once for her films to be made in Technicolour. Judging by the above publicity shot, she was another auburn ('flame-haired') beauty who captivated audiences, on stage and screen, from the 1930s onwards. No wonder, she is in my Top Ten 'beauties' (see 27 December Blog), with two other Titian-haired actresses, Katharine Hepburn and Maureen O'Hara, joining my mother and my wife in that more select Pantheon!  With her fine, almost translucent, chiselled, looks; her polished, 'aristocratic' bearing; with a rather too precise diction at first; she was a 'hit' with her co-stars, if not always with her directors. As one biographer has written: Greer has a dash of the charming naughty Edwardian about her - elegant, stylish, humorously imperious... When she died, on 6th April 1996, two discrepancies in the official biographies were soon put right. She had been born in September 1904, not 1908 (how many other actresses 'lost' years off their lives!), and her birthplace was London not Ireland. Although Garson made several other films of merit, she was/is always known for the 1942 Mrs Miniver. I have a sizeable biography of her by Michael Troyan (1999), which is entitled A Rose for Mrs. Miniver. The Life of Greer Garson.

Walter Pidgeon, her co-star in Mrs. Miniver, was a six foot three Canadian actor, from a well-to-do family in New Brunswick. They first met in 1937/8 during a screen test at MGM. Born in 1897, he had a ten-year career and 33 undistinguished pictures behind him. Now aged 40,  he was to go on to make several successful (if not 'A' movies, at least 'B+' - such as How Green was my Valley in 1941; Madam Curie in 1943; Mrs Parkington in 1944; and The Miniver Story in 1950; the first with Maureen O'Hara and the last three with Greer Garson again), in a career  that lasted until 1978, six years before his death at the age of 87.  

Directed by William Wyler - M.G.M. 1942

What of the movie itself? Notwithstanding the overt propaganda elements - its raison d'être - and the occasional syrupy moments, with a rather chocolate-box village and flower show, the film 'worked' for me, with several quite moving scenes. The message of total war against tyranny is reinforced in a sombre but determined ending, when, to the background of the congregation and choirboys singing Onward Christian Soldiers, RAF planes are seen, through the roofless chancel of the bombed village church, flying overhead. The vicar of Belham delivers a powerful and defiant sermon - the actor Henry Wilcoxon had enlisted in the US Navy, but returned to reshoot a more honed script, which included the lines, ... this is not a war of soldiers in uniform. It is a war of the people - all the people - and it must be fought not only on the battlefield, but in the cities and in the villages, in the factories and on the farms, in the home and in the heart of every man, woman, and child who loves freedom...This is the people's war! It is our war! We are the fighters...And may God defend the right'. It is given added force by the fact that, in the bombing raid which hurriedly ends the successful village flower show, a choir boy is killed, as is Mr. Ballard (brilliantly played by the 68-year-old Henry Travers), the station-master who had won first prize for his 'Mrs. Miniver' rose.

Mr. Ballard shows Mrs. Miniver his rose

In addition, the grand-daughter of Lady Beldon (another part delivered with such realism by Dame May Whitty) and newly-wed daughter-in-law of the Minivers, Carol, has died from enemy aircraft fire whilst passenger in the car driven by Mrs. Miniver. 23 year-old Teresa Wright, who played Carol, was as always (who can forget her in Hitchcock's Shadow of a Doubt) convincing in her role.

Greer Garson and Teresa Wright

There are so many moments of cinematic quality: the 'feudalism' of Lady Beldon in her 'palatial' drawing room; her pronunciation of Swastika as 'sweatsticker'; the National Anthem played at the end of the dance; the terrifying moments spent by the Minivers in their garden shelter; the little ships being gathered together for the Dunkirk evacuation; the tension between Mrs. Miniver and the wounded German flyer - where his outburst about the inevitable victory of the Third Reich is powerfully contrasted with Mrs. Miniver's steadiness of duty (apparently, the bombing of Pearl Harbor allowed Wyler to portray the Nazis for what they were); the return of Vin Minniver to see his dead wife. Wyler certainly delivered, even if there were outbreaks of tension on the set due to his many retakes.

Neither Garson nor Pidgeon initially wanted to play their roles: Pidgeon because he had heard of director Wyler's perfectionist filmmaking methods, Garson because she couldn't see how she could play the mother of a 20+ year-old son. She suggested adding wrinkles, graying hair, horn-rimmed glasses, padded hips and stomach; Wyler implied she looked the right age! The irony was, in real life, Garson married her 'son' Richard Ney! The wedding took place in July 1943, whilst Ney was on leave. Unfortunately, a mere four years later, in September 1947, she sued for, and gained, a divorce . In Court she complained that Ney had disparaged her work and taunted her about being finished as an actress.  She found love again, and the security she desperately wanted, in a marriage to 'Buddy' Fogelson from 1949 to his death in 1987; Greer dying just four years' later.

2004 DVD edition

1943 was dubbed 'the year of Greer'. At the Oscars Mrs. Miniver received nominations for Best Actress, Best Picture, Best Director, Best Actor (Pidgeon), Supporting Actor (Henry Travers), Supporting Actress (both Dame May Whitty and Teresa Wright), Cinematography, Screenplay, Sound Recording, Film Editing and Special Effects.

Winners were: Garson; Wyler; Travers; Wright; Cinematography; Writing (Screenplay). The movie also won Outstanding Motion Picture of the Year.