The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (Bfi Film Classics)

Rating:
Summary: The Archers deserve better.
Review: This is a disappointing and frustrating monograph. Disappointing in that it concerns one of the staggering masterpieces of the greatest filmmakers of all time, the team of Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, and manages to capture only their sadness and intelligence, with little of their madness or danger. This is because, as an author-screenwriter, Kennedy concentrates on Pressburger, the screenwriter. Now, Pressburger is a too often marginalised figure, and a crucial component of the Archers' magic, providing the bass-line spirit, wit and humanity of the films, but to reduce Powell's overwhelming contribution to a couple of patronising lines is to miss the essence and tensions of BLIMP (and surely, as a Scot, she might have found his Celtic roots interesting). A screenplay is not even a tenth of a film, it is the bricks with which the director builds a house. Kennedy's book is an analysis of the script, not the film; she betrays little meaningful knowledge of cinema, and so cannot explain the film as a visual experience, beyond a few platitudes. BLIMP contains arguably the greatest shot in all cinema - as Powell pulls back from the duelling scene - but Kennedy is unable to respond to it satisfactorily. Powell and Pressburger films are such an emotional experience that it is difficult to discuss them analytically. Kennedy offers a very personal, autobiographical response to the film which chimes very much with my own, but sometimes you want to shake her, and ask for something a lttle less comforting and vague. The book is frustrating, not only in its narrow focus, but in its nagging, repeated inaccuracies (Jack Cardiff did not photograph the film, he was a mere Technicolour cameraman - Powell liked his work, and asked him to shoot later Archers' films; the nurse and Barbara Wynne are the same character etc.), its lack of cinematic context or original research, its evasion of whole sequences at the expense of those that fit the thesis. It is extraordinary, though, that in a piece that discusses various notions of 'Home', Kennedy doesn't mention the play Clive attends, 'Ulysses'. So why three stars? Because just reading about one of my favourite films is such a pleasure. Because Kennedy is so nice, clear and familiar, and we share quite a lot in common. Because in between the reassuring padding, she comes up with the odd unique insight that startles you into rethinking old assumptions.