A recommendation
Peter Hoskin 4:45pm
British cinema is renowned largely for its spirit of documentary realism. Think Ken Loach, think Mike Leigh, or – more recently – think Shane Meadows. The four-disc, forty-film box set 'Land of Promise: The British Documentary Film Movement, 1930-1950' (recently released by the British Film Institute, and available here) represents the primordial soup from which this tradition was birthed.
This is not to say that the films within it are primitive. Far from it. They are poetic, lyrical and – in their own quiet way – revolutionary. This is especially true of those documentaries made by the leading lights of the movement – John Grierson, Paul Rotha and Humphrey Jennings – which are strongly featured here. Rotha's Shipyard (1935), for instance, is a strangely moving account of the construction of an ocean liner. And Jennings' Listen to Britain (1942) – a free-associative flight through the sights and sounds of WW2-era Britain – is proof enough for why Lindsay Anderson described him as “the only true poet of the English cinema”.
Perhaps the greatest joy of this set, though, was unearthing films with which I wasn't previously familiar. From the social consciousness of Housing Problems (Elton, Anstey, 1935) and Workers and Jobs (Elton, 1935), to the wartime pomp of Britain at Bay (Watt, 1940) and Night Shift (Chambers, 1942), all are interesting from both artistic and nostalgic perspectives.
I'd go so far as to say that the release of Land of Promise is one of the most important cultural events of the year. An essential purchase not only for cinéastes, but for anyone with an interest in this country of ours.
P.S. A special mention for the 96-page booklet which comes packaged with the set. Its essays and descriptions are invaluable companions to the films themselves.
P.P.S. For when you've done with Land of Promise, a couple of other British documentary picks: Film First's Humphrey Jennings Collection and the BFI's Free Cinema set.
Previous
Comments
mckenzie
June 3rd, 2008 5:15pmI find it difficult to get excited about the history of this Land of (cough) Promise. Clearly we are to be ashamed of our past and welcome with open arms the total annihilation of our culture.
The mind set of this period is so very very different to the mind set of leachate we have to swim for survival in now. If we really want to honor the people and events of this time, we sure as hell are doing it in a very fucking strange way.
Austin Barry
June 3rd, 2008 6:30pmThese films are the momento mori of a people fading into Aztec obscurity. Demographics are destiny as Mark Steyn reminds us and the knobbly-faced, snaggle-toothed British and their Judeo-Christian culture are being slowly but relentlessly effaced as other, less affable, cultures move ever outward in concentric circles from the inner-cities: "The shadows lengthen over the hills and fields and hedgerows and in the distance, but seeming closer in the declining light, the faint cries of the Muezzin pre-figure the future".
Commondog
June 3rd, 2008 6:59pm"Night Shift" is my favourite so far.
Fascinating to see how the war effort brought such a sense of common purpose.
Millions of people toiling so that we could stand up to a much stronger enemy and prevent invasion.
Yet so sad how all of that purpose should produce in our day, a country which is not 'ours' anymore.
GeoffH
June 3rd, 2008 7:44pmCommon purpose?
Tell that to the dockers and miners who carried on their strike-prone ways; to the spivs who ducked and dived; to the factories where skiving was still a way of life (Spitfire production at Caste Bromwich; to the intellectuals who though they were all too, too grand to have anything to do with the war (Benjamin Britten, Christopher Isherwood and W H Auden spring to mind).
I've seen a few bits and pieces from these films and while admiring them am all too conscious that they were part and parcel of a propaganda effort to win a post-war election for Labour.
dearieme
June 3rd, 2008 7:50pmTheir culture was Christian/post-Christian, no "Judeo-" about it, save in the obvious sense necessarily implied by "Christian". A decent inclination to be courteous to Jews shouldn't lead to inaccurate implications about history.
Commondog
June 3rd, 2008 10:25pmGeoffH.
Told it to a shipbuilder and a weaver of that time if they will suffice?
They said there was indeed a sense of belonging to something, perhaps they were having themselves on. There is nothing now to which we can belong was my point. Even the illusion I'd settle for.
Please with the Party politics?
Like myself, neither have voted for years due to the fact that 'they all piss in the same pot'.
If you think they don't, then hey ho off you go, with your finer illusion.