The Sea Shall Not Have Them (1954) -
This wasn't the film that I thought it was going to be, especially not based on the synopsis that the TV had provided. I was expecting to hear all the stories of the various individuals depicted as they waited to be rescued or to rescue. Reminiscences of days gone by and confessions of naughty things, because they thought that death was coming for them, but it was much more basic than that.
And it had a lot of similarities to 'In Which We Serve' (1942), which I thought was actually the better of the two films overall.
The whole thing was quite drawn out, but oddly, I couldn't see where it could be altered to give it a better pace. Although, having said that, the editing and film quality in general was poor and that was a shame because it really wasn't that bad a story, if a bit of a repetition of others available, with it's theme of being stranded in a lifeboat and dangerously close to the enemy, whilst aircraft strafed the water around them with bullets.
There were moments and characters that stuck out more than others.
For instance, I was surprised by Air Craftsman Milliken and the fact that he wasn't in prison for being a blatant homosexual, but I suppose during the war they took all the willing help that they could get and I'm all for diversity in the forces, I just couldn't believe how obvious they were making it with his character in this film from 1954, way before the change in the law in 1967.
I liked Michael Redgrave as Waltby, but had to wonder if Birk Dogarde always played such a wet weekend? His role of MacKay was hot and cold, sometimes literally, I couldn't work out if he was a brave airman or a craven whiner.
And unlike the equivalent American films, where they are all so tough and determined to survive or to go down fighting, this bunch seemed to be happy to give up easily, bar the odd few with a bit more gumption (Redgrave) and most of the rest of them didn't even want to be there in the first place.
So in some ways I thought that it didn't represent the Brits as well as they had hoped it would.
All in all it was a fair piece of work, but I didn't think that it was wholly realistic or delivered with the best production values.
434.22/1000.
This wasn't the film that I thought it was going to be, especially not based on the synopsis that the TV had provided. I was expecting to hear all the stories of the various individuals depicted as they waited to be rescued or to rescue. Reminiscences of days gone by and confessions of naughty things, because they thought that death was coming for them, but it was much more basic than that.
And it had a lot of similarities to 'In Which We Serve' (1942), which I thought was actually the better of the two films overall.
The whole thing was quite drawn out, but oddly, I couldn't see where it could be altered to give it a better pace. Although, having said that, the editing and film quality in general was poor and that was a shame because it really wasn't that bad a story, if a bit of a repetition of others available, with it's theme of being stranded in a lifeboat and dangerously close to the enemy, whilst aircraft strafed the water around them with bullets.
There were moments and characters that stuck out more than others.
For instance, I was surprised by Air Craftsman Milliken and the fact that he wasn't in prison for being a blatant homosexual, but I suppose during the war they took all the willing help that they could get and I'm all for diversity in the forces, I just couldn't believe how obvious they were making it with his character in this film from 1954, way before the change in the law in 1967.
I liked Michael Redgrave as Waltby, but had to wonder if Birk Dogarde always played such a wet weekend? His role of MacKay was hot and cold, sometimes literally, I couldn't work out if he was a brave airman or a craven whiner.
And unlike the equivalent American films, where they are all so tough and determined to survive or to go down fighting, this bunch seemed to be happy to give up easily, bar the odd few with a bit more gumption (Redgrave) and most of the rest of them didn't even want to be there in the first place.
So in some ways I thought that it didn't represent the Brits as well as they had hoped it would.
All in all it was a fair piece of work, but I didn't think that it was wholly realistic or delivered with the best production values.
434.22/1000.