Programme Notes - The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp

Directors: Michael Powell, Emeric PressburgerWriters: Michael Powell, Emeric Pressburger

During World War One, the film industry was completely shut down in aid of the war effort. However, during World War Two politicians realised the potential of film to help boost morale on the home front. Traditional war films of the period followed the same formula of depicting Germans as barbarous, ‘Wagner listening’ monsters, while the British and her allies were respectable, fighting for freedom and justice. Films such as the ‘49th Parallel’ and ‘One of Our Aircraft is Missing’ demonstrate the juxtaposition of the German, British and Allied troops values as they act differently in similar scenarios (that of being stranded in enemy territory).

The ‘Life and Death of Colonel Blimp’, while following a similar pattern to previous war movies of the era, takes a slightly different line. The film follows the 40 year army career of Major-General Clive Wynne-Candy from the end of the Boer war through to the ‘present day’, World War Two, where he is an officer in the home guard. The character of Candy is based on the comic strip character of ‘Colonel Blimp’, designed by David Low, a quintessential old British officer, lamenting about the old ways, fond of the sporting nature of war, and exhibiting a walrus moustache. Key themes explored are that of old vs new as seen in the opening act where a young officer, taking part in a military training exercise against Candy, attacks early, fighting like the enemy, “dishonestly”. This contrasts greatly to Candy’s view that wars were won by “honest soldiering”; that war was sporting.

While usually fond of war films, the War office and Churchill were very opposed to the production of ‘The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp’. While other war films of the period such as the ‘49th Parallel’ depict a clear division of Nazi’s and The British, Colonel Blimp introduced audiences to the character of Theo Kretschmar-Schuldorff, a German officer whom Candy befriends during 1902 after both are injured during a duel. Theo represents the same old style, sporting, gentlemen-like fashion of combat as the Colonel and the film follows their friendship throughout the major conflicts of the first half of the 20th Century. The image of the ‘German’ as equal in morals and values as his British counterpart went against Churchill’s aim to use film to demonstrate the evilness of the the Nazi’s (despite the fact that this ‘moral German’ was opposed to the Nazis and increasingly came to see England as his true “Homeland”). Moreover, the depiction of Candy as a ‘Colonel Blimp’ angered Churchill who thought depictions of the general being out of touch with the modern world and a figure of the past (a key motif in the film) would be poor for moral on the home-front as the war dragged on.

While the lack of support from Churchill and war office made filming more difficult, especially in the sourcing of realistic props and locations, the image of the film as the ‘banned film’ generated mass popularity. Many critics both at the time and today, suggest that ‘Colonel Blimp would of been far less successful had it not been for the attention it garnered by angering Churchill.

As a film exploring World War One, ‘The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp’ examines and frames the war as the first example of a changed world, both in terms of societal values and more specifically the values of war. The contrast of the carefully choreographed and controlled nature of the duel between Candy and Theo, over defending their country's honour, with the book of rules and set terms of engagement contrasts greatly to the chaos of the trenches where communications and transport are impossible and the mud and rain sodden set of 1918 Northern France is a complete antithesis to the clean, simple setting of the duel in the gymnasium 16

years prior. The film explores the poor diplomacy of the war, with Candy communing that no one remembers what the Kaiser or the Prince of Wales said when they spoke suggesting the futility of aristocratic diplomacy. The post war climate is also briefly touched upon, with a montage of the reopening of British cloth business and industries previously being used for war being returned to the civilian. This, in apparent opposition to the Germany Theo describes to Candy where crime was increasing and there was serious hardship. This can be seen to have laid the foundation for the rise of Nazism as “the gangsters finally succeeded in putting the honest citizens in jail”. Alongside its depiction of a changing world of war, through the characters of Edith Hunter, Barbara Wynne, and Johnny Cannon all played by Deborah Kerr traces the changing position of women in society over the same 40 years, paralleling the apparent decrease in Candy and the ‘old guards’ social position and influence.