Film Representations of the Battle of Britain

S. P. Mackenzie. The Battle of Britain on Screen: 'The Few' in British Film and Television Drama. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2007. 181 pp. $34.00, paper, ISBN 978-0-7486-2390-7. Reviewed by James Chapman Published on H-Albion (October, 2008) Commissioned by Mark Hampton (Lingnan University) Readers familiar with MacKenzie’s previous ries of case studies. He begins with The Lion Has books, particularly British War Films, 1939-1945: Wings (1939), the frst British propaganda feature The Services and the Cinema (2000) and The film of the war and one that anticipates the battle Colditz Myth: British and Commonwealth Prison‐ itself by nearly a year. The Lion Has Wings, which ers of War in Nazi Germany (2004), will know Alexander Korda rushed into production upon the what to expect from his latest work. They will not outbreak of war, was a hodgepodge of newsreel be disappointed. MacKenzie, professor of history footage, documentary extracts, and some studio- at the University of South Carolina, specializes in filmed sequences, intended as propaganda for the media and cultural representations of the Second RAF. It was meant to reassure the British public World War. The Battle of Britain on Screen is the that, contrary to Stanley Baldwin’s prediction of first book-length study of the flm and television 1932, the bomber will not always get through; in representation of the air war over southern Eng‐ fact it will not get through at all. The Lion Has land fought between the Royal Air Force and the Wings has been derided by most commentators Luftwaffe in the late summer of 1940. This is an for its class-bound social politics, which hark back event that has become part of the popular mythol‐ to the British cinema of the 1930s rather than for‐ ogy of the British experience of the Second World ward to the new democratic social realism that War, popularized in Winston Churchill’s famous was to emerge during the war. It also includes a (though oft-misquoted) remark: “Never in the reconstruction of the Kiel Canal Raid--the frst of‐ field of human conflict has so much been owed by fensive operation undertaken by the RAF during so many to so few.” the war--that grossly exaggerates its success. How‐ ever, MacKenzie argues that in its staging of the MacKenzie maps the history of the visual rep‐ battle for air supremacy--Fighter Command is resentation of the Battle of Britain through a se‐ shown repelling a fctitious German attack--the H-Net Reviews film accurately predicted many of the details, es‐ war flms such as Angels One Five (1952) and pecially the chain of command. Reach for the Sky (1956) offered new perspectives on the battle. The role of radar, which for security The Lion Has Wings tried to predict what the reasons had not featured in wartime flms, could Battle of Britain would be like. As soon as the bat‐ now be revealed. Angels One Five was an attempt tle itself was over the question became: how will to represent the battle as a national experience. It it be remembered? Hollywood got there frst with told the familiar story of a hot-headed young pilot A Yank in the RAF (1941)--one of a cycle of "Holly‐ (played by John Gregson) who has to learn the wood British" flms which in this case had a dash‐ hard way the importance of teamwork rather ing young Tyrone Power as the all-American fy- than individual heroism. The flm also looked be‐ boy who shows the stiff-assed Brits how to do it. yond the pilots to show the role of ground crew Power was followed by Ronald Reagan in Interna‐ and control room staff. Reach for the Sky, in con‐ tional Squadron (1942) and Robert Stack in Eagle trast, focused very much on the role of the indi‐ Squadron (1942). Needless to say none of these vidual. This hagiography of Douglas Bader, the pi‐ films were particularly notable for their authen‐ lot who lost both his legs in a fying accident in ticity. The frst British feature flm focusing on the the 1930s but returned to command a fghter battle was Dangerous Moonlight (1941) which wing during the Battle of Britain, was one of the starred Anton Walbrook (an Austrian émigré ac‐ most successful British flms of the decade. It tor) as a Polish concert pianist who escapes from starred Kenneth More, who plays Bader in his Warsaw to join the RAF. These were merely pre‐ best “good chap” persona. It was concerned to ludes, however, to the definitive wartime treat‐ present Bader as an inspirational role model. ment of the battle, Leslie Howard’s The First of MacKenzie shows how the flm whitewashed Bad‐ the Few (1942). Howard directed and played R. J. er’s character and exaggerated his reputation as a Mitchell, the designer of the Spitfire, the sleek and fighter ace. elegant intercept fghter that had already become synonymous with the Battle of Britain. The First As the cinema-going audience declined in the of the Few has already been thoroughly re‐ late 1950s and 1960s, the flm industry turned to searched by Anthony Aldgate and Jeffrey Richards “big” pictures to tempt them back. Battle of in their book, Britain Can Take It: The British Cin‐ Britain (1969) was one of a cycle of epic interna‐ ema in the Second World War (1986), but MacKen‐ tional war movies that also included The Longest zie is able to offer some new insights. He shows Day, Battle of the Bulge, Tora! Tora! Tora!, Mid‐ how Howard transformed the character of way, and A Bridge Too Far. MacKenzie documents Mitchell, in reality a highly practical engineer, how producers Harry Saltzman and Benjamin S. into a romantic visionary whose revolutionary Fisz resisted the demands of Hollywood studio ex‐ design for the Spitfire was supposedly inspired by ecutives to make it another version of A Yank in watching seagulls in fight. This was consistent the RAF and insisted on authenticity. Director Guy with Howard’s screen persona but was far from Hamilton said that his aim was to “destroy the being an accurate representation of the man. Not myth” of the battle by showing it “the way it was” that it mattered: The First of the Few was a re‐ (p. 81). MacKenzie shows how, for the frst time in sounding critical and popular success. the cinematic historiography, Battle of Britain ex‐ plored the divisions within Fighter Command, In the 1950s, as Britain faced up to its decline particularly the debate between Keith Park and as a world power and the loss of its empire, reliv‐ Leigh Mallory (commanders, respectively, of 11 ing the Second World War became something of a national pastime for British flm producers. Post‐ 2 H-Net Reviews Group and 12 Group of Fighter Command) over makers in order to get the technical details right. the “big wings” advocated by Mallory. One recurring issue that MacKenzie highlights is how difficult it was for flmmakers to get the right Following the epic treatment of Battle of sort of aircraft for close-ups. Even in 1952, during Britain, most later representations have been on the production of Angels One Five, there were the small screen. London Weekend Television’s only three serviceable Hurricanes available to ironically titled Piece of Cake (1988) was the frst represent an entire squadron. The producers of true revisionist account of the battle. It followed Battle of Britain recruited the Spanish air force, the fortunes of the fctitious “Hornet Squadron” which few Heinkel bombers that resembled the from September 1939 to September 1940. Piece of He-111s fown during the battle itself. The same Cake portrayed the “knights of the air” as very hu‐ sole Spitfire saw service in A Piece of Cake and A man and fallible, in some cases even psychologi‐ Perfect Hero--but that was a model from later in cally fawed, characters. It documents a catalogue the war rather than the Mark II in service during of errors, bad tactics and personal rivalries. the Battle of Britain. MacKenzie’s book will cer‐ MacKenzie draws upon an extensive range of con‐ tainly make fascinating reading for those pedants temporary reviews to show how Piece of Cake di‐ who routinely complain that producers of war vided critics. While some admired its boldness, films and tv series invariably get the details others were outraged by what they regarded as a wrong. debunking of the heroic myth of “the Few”. More satisfying was A Perfect Hero (1991), another six- MacKenzie is alert to the methodological is‐ part drama that starred Nigel Havers as a pilot sues involved in using flm and television as who has to come to terms with severe injuries sources. The book is well informed by the rele‐ and undergoes reconstructive surgery after his vant historiographical literature. What he demon‐ face is horribly burned. Clearly this story owed a strates is how flms “can tell us things about the debt to Richard Hillary’s posthumously published time in which they were made and shown” (p. 3). The Last Enemy (1942), which had been adapted Thus the propaganda imperative of flms like The by the BBC in the 1950s--sadly no tapes of the pro‐ Lion Has Wings and The First of the Few deter‐ duction have survived. A Perfect Hero attracted mined how they represented the RAF. Battle of significantly more viewers than A Piece of Cake, Britain, in contrast, reflects a revisionist perspec‐ suggesting that the British public preferred its tive influenced not only by new historical knowl‐ more melodramatic but less controversial take on edge about the battle itself but also by changing the battle.

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