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Home , Carol Reed, Emeric Pressburger, Googie Withers, Kind Hearts and Coronets, Millions Like Us, Norman Wisdom

ISSUE 37 SCREEN EDUCATION

8 This is the second in Screen Education’s series on national cinemas, which will draw attention to the histories and contempo- rary production of film industries from around the world. Our aim is to highlight the ongoing significance and interconnected- ness of these industries to world cinema, and to extend teachers’ and students’ awareness of film production beyond the limits of Hollywood.

NOW AND THEN: THE EBBS AND FLOWS OF BRITISH CINEMA BRIAN McFARLANE

WHAT IS IT?

British cinema, in Australia at least but probably elsewhere too, has always occupied a sort of middle ground. ISSUE 37 In the days when it was a recognizable national cinema, with a regular output and with cinemas largely

(sometimes exclusively) devoted to screening this, it fell somewhere between the mainstream and the art- SCREEN EDUCATION house. Those days came to an end in the early 1960s, but until then what was often referred to as ‘a good British film’ was seen as a sort of opposition to the Hollywood domination of our screens without, however, giving us the arthouse trouble of reading subtitles. Like the revived Australian cinema since the 1970s, British cinema had the problem—as a national cinema trying to stake out an audience area of its own—of using the same language (more or less) as Hollywood, whose conquest of the world’s English-speaking audiences was completed during the teens of the twentieth century. It was a conquest that met with little resistance from the public, but there were always other filmmakers who needed to create their own stories and who sought to persuade that public to give them at least some of its attention. 9 Select Filmography ecades have passed since the (1945) and Hamlet (1948); and of short stories NB Though I have set out the situation when British cinema by (The Fallen Idol, 1948) titles in this Filmography in was a clear entity on Australian and Somerset Maugham (Quartet, 1948). For chronological order, and though Dscreens. Cinema-going habits once, critics were almost unanimous in their I did want to indicated some have changed greatly since then, in matters praise of literary adaptations, fi nding them sense of spread over the dec- of production and exhibition, but it is still true much more ‘faithful’ to their source works ades, my main aim has been to say that some fi lms feel as if they could than Hollywood usually was, and regarding to represent the main areas of only be British, whatever their indebtedness this as a matter for praise. British fi lm production over that to fi lmmaking conventions. In this essay, I period—that is, to ensure that want to suggest some key defi ning features But there was more to Britain’s being a ‘liter- the most infl uential fi lmmakers, of British cinema, as well as indicating some ary cinema’ than merely a host of adapta- studios, genres and production of the periods when it has been most suc- tions. Whether adapted from novels and trends are represented. This cessful. It is worth keeping in mind the truism plays or not, the fi lms tended to rely more on being so, I have not deliberately that any viable national cinema must also be the verbal than the visual to ensure putting sought out the esoteric and I’ve an international cinema; that is, it must have their meanings across. A later director, Karel also been mindful of what titles some kind of identity on the world scene—in Reisz, who began directing features in 1960, might actually be available. For Britain’s case, at least on the Anglophone once described a lot of earlier British fi lms instance, most of the famous scene; and it must be commercially viable as as ‘photographs of people talking’, implying documentaries of the 1930s or well as culturally specifi c. There are today, for that they didn’t make their visual imagery the immensely prolifi c ‘B’ movies instance, plenty of British fi lms made which work hard enough and that they were inclined (the supporting fi lms in double are certainly wholly indigenous in content and to be rather static while the talk held sway. bills of the 1950s and 1960s) are personnel, but a great proportion of these This is an exaggerated account, but there is very hard to come by. The fi lmog- fi lms either never see the some truth in it: some British raphy then is generally speaking light of day or fail to escape cinema of even this ‘golden a mainstream guide to the sort the shores of their native age’ can seem very wordy of fi lms that most substantially land. compared with its American account for the entity ‘British counterparts. Also, British cinema’. For those who’d like What are British cinema always liked to at- more out of the way titles, please fi lms like? tract the services of authors get in touch with me. who had earned their The two replies most often reputations in purely verbal The Films given to this unanswerable question are that media (so did Hollywood but it tended to shut British release date, director’s it is on the one hand a literary cinema and on them in rooms with a typewriter and ignore name, and brief generic com- the other a cinema that has favoured realism. them). As a result, there was often, for better ment in brackets. *These three There’s much more to be said about the defi n- as well as worse, a close alliance between documentaries are available on ing tendencies of British fi lms than these two fi lmmakers on the one hand and novelists and a compilation DVD of ‘Empire terms suggest, but they do embody a good playwrights on the other. Graham Greene, Marketing Board Classics’ deal of what was most important about the who worked several times with director Carol prestige arm of the British industry. Further- Reed, is perhaps the most notable example, *Drifters (1929, John Grierson, more, both the literary and the realist strands but another is thriller-writer who documentary) were seen as offering some sort of response wrote several screenplays for director Roy *Industrial Britain (1931, Robert to the irresistible glamour and narrative verve Ward Baker and others. The positive aspect Flahery, documentary) of Hollywood. of such collaborations was a high level of skil- The Private Life of Henry VIII ful verbal characterization through dialogue; (1933, , historical ‘Like a good book’: a literary it was then a matter for the director to ensure drama and international breakthrough cinema that the verbal didn’t swamp the visual. The for British fi lms) trend in literary adaptation continues unabat- One of the most obvious ways in which Britain ed to this day, where British fi lms such as The *Song of Ceylon (1934, Basil

ISSUE 37 qualifi es as a literary cinema is in the prepon- Wings of the Dove (1997) and I Capture the Wright, documentary) derance of adaptations from literary sources, Castle (2003) still fi nd appreciative audiences. (1938, Alfred including novels, plays and short stories. In its

SCREEN EDU Hitchcock) period of highest prestige, in the mid-to-late ‘So true to life’: a realist cinema 1940s, most of the fi lms on which that pres- Pygmalion (1938, Anthony Asquith

C tige depended were derived from literature: Commercial British cinema of the 1930s, with ATION and Leslie Howard, comedy adapted there were defi nitive versions of Dickens’s some exceptions, was apt to be at some from George Bernard Shaw’s play) novels in ’s Great Expectations remove from the facts of life as most of the (1946) and Oliver Twist (1948); of Shake- British population lived it, emerging as they 10 speare’s plays in ’s Henry V did from The Depression at the start of the

continued opposite... decade only to be confronted with the rise less likely to acknowledge these. One can Millions Like Us (1943, Frank of and the imminence of the Second see why they were sniffy about No Orchids Launder and , realist World War. But you’d hardly have guessed at for Miss Blandish (1948): it is ridiculous in drama of WW2) such realities from the overwhelming output of its efforts to be sadistically compelling; but (1944, , the fi lm studios. There were hundreds of so- Rock and They Made Me a Fugitive, wartime drama) ciety comedies (with madcap heiresses, and both made in 1947 and both hard-hitting, (1944, Michael lords disguised as butlers) and thrillers with intelligent thrillers with a whiff of postwar Powell and , drama master criminals intent on world domination, malaise and grim corruption about them mixing wartime and timeless themes) but outside the documentary (though Brighton Rock is set movement there was very pre-war, it could not have Henry V (1945, Laurence Olivier, little sense given of ordinary been made then) deserve adaptation of Shakespeare’s play) lives. serious consideration. They Brief Encounter (1945, David Lean, are the progenitors of, say, romantic drama) The documentarists, led by Get Carter (1970) or Lock, John Grierson, claimed to be Stock and Two Smoking The Wicked Lady (1946, Leslie representing life as it was, in Barrels (1998) or Sexy Beast Arliss, costume melodrama) fi lms with titles like Industrial (2000), all as British as fi sh Great Expectations (1946, David Britain (1933) and Housing and chips, but, ‘back then’, Lean, drama adapted from Charles Problems (1935). Their fi lms, however, were this sort of fi lm was felt to project unsuitable Dickens’ novel) not the stuff of popular cinema, at least not images of Britain. Nevertheless, crime fi lms, (1947, Michael until wartime fi lmmaking absorbed some of at various levels of seriousness and ambition, Powell and Emeric Pressburger, drama the techniques of documentary into fi ction- have been a staple of British cinema, often of set in Himalayan convent) fi lmmaking. By this I mean that popular British course benefi ting from realist trappings and cinema began to pay more attention to fi lming derived from literary works. The pre-inter- Brighton Rock (1947, John Boult- in actual locations, and to be more concerned val supporting fi lm, in the days when movie ing, gangster thriller, from Graham with the way its audiences were living and programming usually required two fi lms, was Greene’s novel) working, whether in the armed forces or on most often a crime fi lm. With chaps in trench The Winslow Boy (1948, Anthony the home front. Films such as In Which We coats trudging round darkened alleys and Asquith, adaptation of play dramatizing Serve (1942), The Way Ahead (1944) and The with just the corner of a nightclub for a sleazy famous miscarriage of justice) Way to the Stars (1945) dramatized life in the transaction to take place, the crime genre was various services while fi lms such as Millions no doubt the cheapest way to fi ll a market (1949, Like Us (1943) and Waterloo Road (1945) demand. , comedy about canvassed a wide social range of lives that serial killer) carried on at home. Documentary, it could be Ask many people of a certain age what they (1949, Carol Reed, said, gave British cinema a shot in the arm liked best about British cinema and they will thriller set in postwar ) that carried over to the postwar years, and be apt to adduce the brand name of ‘Ealing resulted in a period of international acclaim Comedy’. For a decade or more, a mod- The Happiest Days of Your Life (1950, , fi lm version of it never enjoyed before or est studio on Ealing Green school-set farce) since. The preoccupation in suburban west with realism has never gone turned out comedies based The Wooden Horse (1950, Jack away and its infl uence is on a keen but affection- Lee, famous wartime escape drama) still to be felt, for example, ate grasp of aspects of the The African Queen (1951, John in ’s socialisti- British character; fi lms which Huston, Anglo-American comedy- cally inclined explorations of won a devoted following adventure) working lives or, to a lesser throughout the English- extent, in ’s urban speaking world in a way that Mandy (1952, Alexander Mackend- comedy-dramas with their few other British fi lms did. rick, Ealing drama of deaf child) Swiftian ferocity. And yet, though the term ‘Ealing Comedy’ Genevieve (1953, Henry Cornelius,

resonates so strongly with the postwar resil- comedy of vintage cars and battling ISSUE 37 What else was there? ience of British values, the fi lms are actually sexes)

quite different from each other. Passport to SCREEN EDUCATION The critics discerned a ‘quality cinema’ Pimlico (1949), in which a small area of sub- emerging and privileged the literary and the urban London fi nds evidence that it belongs realist strands of the enterprise, so that other to the duchy of Burgundy but insists on its kinds of fi lms received less benign attention. right to be British, and Crime fi lms, for instance, were always a part (1951), in which a respectable bank clerk FIRST PAGE: THE MOTHER FAR LEFT: GREAT EXPECTATIONS LEFT FROM of the British cinema offering, but middle- () successfully masterminds TOP: THEY MADE ME A FUGITIVE; LOCK, class, even somewhat genteel, critics were a plan to rob the Bank of of one STOCK AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS 11 The Dam Busters (1955, Michael million pounds, are perhaps the key fi lms in professions (hospitals, camping, literature, Anderson, drama of wartime invention) the mass recollection of Ealing. Both show history, etc.). Totally unsubtle, these fi lms, A Night to Remember (1958, people of modest situation taking on the toffs with their repertory company of comic Roy Ward Baker, drama of sinking of and rulers—and (almost) winning. Others players and absolute competence behind the Titanic) in this famous series of fi lms are sharper, the camera, evoke, as has often been said, tougher and darker: Whisky the caricature comedy of The Revenge of Frankenstein Galore (1948), Kind Hearts seaside postcards, and (1958, Terence Fisher, started Hammer and Coronets (1949) and viewed in the right frame of horror success story) (1955) are mind can make one laugh Room at the Top (1959, Jack just as much ‘Ealing’, but to the point of rupture. Clayton, realist drama of working-class they leave us feeling less man’s rise) comfortable. One of the most lucrative genres in British cinema Peeping Tom (1960, , These fi lms made their history was the horror fi lm, controversial drama of murder and chief appeal to a more sophisticated, now fi rmly associated with Hammer Studios, obsession) educated audience (they tended to be which came to be based in a country house Saturday Night and Sunday arthouse successes in American college at Bray, Berkshire, that was pressed into Morning (1960. Karel Reisz, realist towns), but there were other layers of equally repeated service to provide the settings for drama of working-class life) ‘British’ comedy that should be noted here. the activities of legendary horror fi gures, like Victim (1961, , first Among these I include the 1930s stage- Dracula and Frankenstein. Hammer had been mainstream drama with homosexuality bound comedies derived from the ‘Aldwych making modest second features (again, for as theme) farces’: hectically plotted intrigues usually set pre-interval screening) before striking pay dirt in ‘society’ and with stereotypical characters with the science-fi ction piece, The Quater- Lawrence of Arabia (1962, David (meek husband and mass Experiment (1955), Lean, epic adventure/biopic) domineering wife, etc.) and The Curse of Frank- The Servant (1963, Joseph Losey, repeating the success they enstein (1957). The latter drama of class and sexuality) had enjoyed on the stage starred of the Aldwych theatre and Peter Cushing who, Carry On Cleo (1964, Gerald Thomas, London, and usually along with director Terence broad comedy in famous series) derived from plays by Ben Fisher, became indelibly A Hard Day’s Night (1964, Richard Travers. They are rather associated with the product Lester, Beatles musical) daunting to watch now as known as ‘Hammer Horror’. Those Magnifi cent Men in Their they seem so artifi cial, so Other companies, includ- Flying Machines (1965, Ken An- removed from any sort of ing Tigon and Amicus, nakin, all-star comedy) real life, but they were popular then. So too jumped on the horror bandwagon and they were the more demotic stars, Gracie Fields also produced some stylish shudders, but (1966, Roy Boulting, The Family Way and —among the highest- Hammer became the most commercially domestic comedy-drama) paid entertainers of their day—overcoming successful operation in the history of British If … (1968, Lindsay Anderson, drama class barriers with their northern comic cinema. Critics of course reviled them at the of schoolboy rebellion) characters and their singing. In the 1950s, time; very serious people now see in them Norman Wisdom, in cloth cap, trousers too a ‘return of the repressed’; audiences just The Devil Rides Out (1968, Terence short for him and jackets too tight, enjoyed lapped them up. Fisher, Hammer horror) a phenomenal run of Women in Love (1969, Ken Russell, box-offi ce hits, inevitably The costume melodrama drama of love and sexuality from D. H. cast as the ‘little man’ who enjoyed enormous popular Lawrence novel) (improbably) overcomes success in wartime when Oh! What a Lovely War (1969, villains and wins a pretty fi lms such as The Man in , all-star musical girl at the end. Titles such Grey (1943), Fanny by Gas-

ISSUE 37 about the First World War) as (1953), light (1944) and The Wicked (1956) and Lady (1945) provided just (1971, Sunday Bloody Sunday Follow a Star (1959) hint the sort of escapism audi- SCREEN EDU , romantic triangle with at their setting and/or their ences, especially female a difference) optimism. Nothing could be more English audiences, were looking for. Again, critically

C continued opposite ... than the ‘Carry On’ series which began with excoriated by those reviewers who were busy ATION Carry On Sergeant (1958), a broad swipe at praising the literary and the realist, these fi lms RIGHT FROM TOP: WHISKY GALORE; army training, and was fi nally laid to rest after had to wait for several decades before their WICKED LADY; SHAKESPEARE IN LOVE Carry On Columbus (1992), having thumbed signifi cance was understood. At least part of FAR RIGHT FROM TOP: EVERGREEN; A 12 HARD DAY’S NIGHT; THE 39 STEPS its nose at most British institutions and their popularity seems to have derived from their preoccupation with women’s experi- have seemed disheartening to try to main- Don’t Look Now (1973, Nicolas ence, and the fact that they were set in earlier tain careers in British fi lm, when the industry Roeg, drama with supernatural centuries merely disguised but did not dispel seemed to be almost totally overshadowed by element) their relevance to the lives of contemporary Hollywood, there are still some clearly discern- Barry Lyndon (1975, Stanley women who were facing ible periods when British Kubrick, costume drama, adapted undreamed-of challenges in cinema was commercially from Thackeray) the war years. The costume and/or critically popular. The Spy Who Loved Me (1977, fi lm continues to be part of Only in recent times has the , James Bond ad- the mainstream of British rich heritage of British silent venture) fi lmmaking: just think of more cinema begun to receive recent titles such as A Room its scholarly due. Until the Death on the Nile (1978, John with a View (1986), Mrs First World War, British Guillermin, all-star Agatha Christie Brown (1997), and Shake- fi lmmaking techniques and mystery) speare in Love (1999), and inventiveness were more Chariots of Fire (1981, Hugh of the never-ending stream of BBC television or less pegging even with Hollywood’s, but Hudson, drama with sports back- adaptations of the classics. the intervention of war naturally impacted ground) much more savagely on the British than on British cinema could never do musicals. the American industry. Nevertheless, a recent Gandhi (1982, Richard Attenbor- London Town (1946), albeit with an American book, Young and Innocent? The Cinema in ough, epic biopic) director, Wesley Ruggles, is one of the famous Britain 1896-1930, makes clear that there was A Room with a View (1984, fl ops of British cinema. Somehow, the kind of a lot more going on in Britain than the Hol- , period romance from energy and utopian aspiration that made the lywood usurpation of fi lm history might have E.M. Forster novel) Hollywood musical famous eluded the sensi- led one to believe. Everyone knows that Alfred Distant Voices, Still Lives bility of British fi lmmakers. Hitchcock began his career (1988, , poetic-real- There are exceptions: in Britain’s silent cinema, but ist drama) Gracie Fields’s working- there is a good deal more that class ‘sing as we go’ fi lms scholars are fi nding it worth Four Weddings and a Funeral (one is actually called their while to explore. (1994, Mike Newell, romantic com- Sing as We Go [1934] and edy) , forget- The 1930s were wildly pro- Land and Freedom (1995, Ken ting her working-class lifi c but, with certain obvious Loach, political drama) background in such fi lms exceptions, more noted for as Evergreen (1934), had quantity than quality. A Quota Trainspotting (1996, , their successes in cheering up the 1930s as Act passed in 1927 sought to ensure that a black comedy) they struggled out of The Depression. Apart percentage of British-made fi lms was regularly Secrets & Lies (1996, Mike Leigh, from these, the only other serious exception screened in British cinemas, and the percent- realist comedy-drama) to the rule with which this paragraph opened age rose in subsequent Acts of the 1930s. (1997, was the pair of fi lms which cashed in on the One harmful effect of this legislation was the The Wings of the Dove Iain Softley, drama adapted from Beatles’ sensational success in the 1960s: A production of shoddily-made fi lms, often by Henry James) Hard Day’s Night (1964) and Help! (1965). For American companies, to meet the demands of lavish production numbers, and for epic fi lming the Act and the decade saw the production of The Full Monty (1997, Peter Cat- in a general way, there was probably not suf- the ‘quota quickie’: a fi lm made as cheaply as taneo, realist comedy-drama) fi cient fi nancial backing to possible and doomed to early Lock, Stock and Two Smoking compete with Hollywood; oblivion, having satisfi ed the Barrels (1998, crime drama) though, ironically, in later letter of the legislation. Even in decades American compa- this unprepossessing climate, Bridget Jones’s Diary (2001, nies would take advantage there was some notable British Sharon Maguire, romantic comedy) of the technical expertise fi lmmaking. Alexander Korda’s (2002, Robert Alt- and cheaper production The Private Life of Henry VIII man, country-house mystery) ISSUE 37 costs available in such (1933) was a breakthrough, All or Nothing (2002, Mike Leigh,

British studios as Pine- and the Hungarian Korda went SCREEN EDUCATION realist drama) wood, where, for example, on to produce such quintes- much of Superman (1978) and Batman (1989) sentially British projects as Sanders of the In This World (2003, Michael Win- were fi lmed. River (1935) and The Four Feathers (1939); terbottom, documentary drama) Hitchcock made the wonderfully invigorating Shaun of the Dead (2004, Edgar When the going was good and witty thrillers The 39 Steps (1935) and Wright, horror comedy) The Lady Vanishes (1938); and director Victor Though there were long stretches when it must Saville made two charming tales of regional 13 BELOW FROM TOP: BRIDGET JONES’S life, The Good Companions (1933) and South a clear sense of identity again. DIARY AND THE MOTHER CENTRE: Riding (1938), both based on popular novels BRIDGET JONES’S DIARY RIGHT PAGE FROM TOP: NOTTING HILL; TOPSY- of the time. The mid-1990s to the present day present TURVY; GOSFORD PARK the most prolifi c, and culturally most hope- Meanwhile, the documentary movement ful, period of British cinema since the mid was drawing different portraits of British -1960s, but there is no longer the sense of life and only in the 1940s, when war gave a fi rmly based studio system to support (or fi lmmakers a subject they could embrace as constrain) fi lmmakers. The latter are often no one else could (certainly not Hollywood, dependent on government intervention or on distant as it was from the war), that fi ction the pervasive co-production, which, in com- fi lm took on the realist trappings of docu- mercial terms, means essentially American mentary and in the process found the kinds fi nancial investment. This kind of collabora- of audience the documentary itself could not tion no doubt allows a fi lm industry to persist have found. While Fanny by Gaslight and in Britain, but increasingly one has to wonder The Wicked Lady were having their bodices whether something distinctively British is ripped by cads like (one of being lost in the process. Films like Notting the great actors of British cinema), aspects Hill (1999) and Bridget Jones’s Diary (2001) of documentary realism were infi ltrating have been very successful and are undeni- other kinds of commercial fi lmmaking. Just ably funny and charming, but would they watch Ealing’s domestic drama, It Always have found such international audiences Rains on Sunday (1947), or without Julia Roberts and (1950), and Renee Zellweger, imported to it is clear that a concern bolster the fi lms’ star value in with the everyday aspects of the US—and the rest of the everyday lives has found its world? Small-scale British way into the entertainment fi lms, like The Mother (2003), fi lm, as distinct from the tend to have to fi ght for their documentary with its didactic lives with distributors geared intentions. As a direct result to the huge US English- of this injection of realism of speaking market. place and person, along with the prestigious literary ad- Who matters in aptations noted above, and British cinema? with the maverick cinephilia of (The Red Shoes, for example), Today the answer to this question is most British cinema reached its highest peak of likely to be producers attached to interna- international interest. tional companies; British personnel are no doubt grateful to them for ensuring a degree The 1950s, described by one critic as a ‘bat- of exposure that would otherwise be unlikely. tleship-grey’ decade, tended to replay war- The days when a British fi lm was one made time heroics and to settle for undemanding in a British studio with British personnel and ‘family fare’ (what kind of family could they with culturally specifi c content are now past. have had in mind?), but at the end of the However, the serious study of British cinema decade two major developments were ob- involves coming to terms with ‘Then’ as well served. One, the Hammer phenomenon, has as ‘Now’. It involves understanding how already been addressed; the other, the ‘New the kinds of fi lmmaking mentioned above Wave’ of realism, brought prestige rather dominated either critical or popular percep- than a commercial bonanza. Directors such tions of British cinema at those key periods

ISSUE 37 as Karel Reisz (Saturday Night and Sunday I’ve suggested. Morning, 1960), (The Lone- liness of the Long Distance Runner, 1962), The main roots of British cinema, what gives SCREEN EDU John Schlesinger (A Kind of Loving, 1962) it any sense of individuality, are I think to be and Lindsay Anderson (This Sporting Life, found in the war years and the postwar dec-

C 1963) brought a whiff of bracing Northern ade. That is perhaps when the Britishness of ATION air to British cinema. Sadly, this too soon British cinema was forged, and—no coinci- gave way to the modish idiocies of ‘swinging dence—when it won the most international London’, and, apart from the sturdy horror acclaim. Students of British cinema will 14 fi lm genre, British cinema never found such need to explore the work of directors such as David Lean, Anthony Asquith, Carol Reed, Select Bibliography Michael Powell and others named above— General histories and references fi lmmakers whose name signifi ed the product of a national cinema in their time. Those • I. Aitken, Film and Reform: John Grierson names suggested fi lms that were intensely and the Documentary Film Movement, British, but which also found substantial Routledge, London, 1990. worldwide audiences. Contemporary names • I. Aitken, (ed.) The Documentary Film like Leigh and Loach or the brilliant Michael Movement: An Anthology, Edinburgh Uni. Winterbottom (uniting both the literary and Press, Edinburgh, 1998. realist strands) gain further resonance when • R. Armes, A Critical History of British considered in the light of their forebears. Cinema, London, 1978. • J. Ashby and A. Higson, (eds) British What I am saying is that, in 2004, any serious Cinema, Past and Present, Routledge, study of British cinema will have to take into London, 2000. account decades now past. For a couple of • C. Barr, (ed.) All Our Yesterdays: Ninety decades, stars such as , Julie Years of British Cinema, BFI, London, Christie, Richard Harris, Jean Kent, Marga- 1986. ret Lockwood, James Mason, , • J. Caughie and K. Rockett, The Compan- Laurence Olivier and Googie Withers were a ion to British and Irish Cinema, Cassell, powerful inducement for people to go to the London, 1996. cinema. There are British names as potent • R. Cross, The Big Book of British Cinema, today (think of , Emma Thomp- London, 1984. son, Ewan McGregor, , • J. Curran and V. Porter (eds), British , Colin Firth) though they may Cinema History, Weidenfeld & Nicolson, not be so fi rmly associated with British fi lms. London, 1983. Filmmaking has become a global activity and • W. W. Dixon (ed.), Re-viewing British Cin- British fi lmmakers are as likely to turn up in ema 1900-1992, State University of New American fi lms as British ones. British cinema York Press, Albany, NY, 1994. tends to throw up luminaries too bright to • S. Harper, Women in British Cinema: be contained by what it has to offer. British Mad, Bad and Dangerous to Know, Con- fi lmmakers—directors, stars, composers, tinuum, London, 2000. designers, writers—go on winning awards— • A. Higson (ed.), Dissolving Views: Key sometimes Oscars, the most coveted of all Writings on British Cinema, Cassell, Lon- fi lm awards—but in the process it is all too don, 1996. probable that what made them distinctive will • B. McFarlane, The Encyclopedia of British be blurred. Film, Methuen/BFI, London, 2003. • R. Murphy, The British Cinema Book, BFI, Even so, fi lms do still turn up which one feels London, Charles Herridge, 2001. could only be British, wherever the money • G. Perry, The Great British Picture Show, has come from. I think of fi lms like Sense Pavilion Books, London, 1974. and Sensibility (1995), The Full Monty (1997), • J. Richards, Films and British National Shakespeare in Love (1999), Topsy-Turvy Identity, Manchester University Press, (2000) and Gosford Park (2002). All of these 1997. are UK/US co-productions, and probably • A. Slide, 50 Classic British Films 1932-82, most of the fi nance involved is American, but New York, 1985. it is hard to think of them as anything other • A. Spicer, Typical Men: The Represen- than British. It is worth wondering what kinds tation of Masculinity in Popular British of qualities might be responsible for this, and Cinema, London, 2001.

to trace their origins back to when British cin- • S. Street, British National Cinema, ISSUE 37 ema may not have exactly ruled the waves, Routledge, London, 1997.

but did make a signifi cant splash. • J. R. Taylor and J. Kobal, Portraits of SCREEN EDUCATION the British Cinema, Nat. Portrait Gallery, Brian McFarlane’s Encyclopedia of British Film London, 1985. (2003, Methuen/BFI) has been reprinted. He • J. Vermilye, The Great British Films, Se- is now preparing the 2nd edition for 2005 publi- caucus, Citadel, NJ, 1978. cation and co-authoring a book on the British • P. Warren, British Cinema in Pictures: The ‘B’ Movie. • British Film Collection, Batsford, London, 1993. 15