Back in 1987, writer/director John Boorman’s semi-autobiographical Hope and Glory presented the London Blitz as something of a “boys’ own adventure,” focusing on children who were too young to understand what was happening, and viewed the chaos as oddly exciting.
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| Shortly after joining hundreds of similarly frightened Londoners seeking shelter from a bomb raid, by fleeing into a subway, George (Elliott Heffernan) suddenly becomes aware of something just as dangerous... |
The setting is London, September 1940; Hitler’s Germany has just begun the eight-month bombing campaign designed to terrify England into quick submission. (He sure got that wrong.) As one immediate result, Operation Pied Piper evacuated 800,000 children from urban centers to outlying rural communities, over the course of just three days.
McQueen’s film opens on a terrifying scene, as untrained and outmatched firefighters attempt to extinguish multiple blazes caused by the most recent attack. It’s noisy, chaotic and scary ... particular when the scene shifts skyward, as more bombs slowly spiral their way down. In a few brief minutes, McQueen and his filmmaking team sketch the horror of random death and destruction.
This prologue is replaced by brief random shots, concluding with a field of flowers, which slowly fades as piano music is heard. Working-class single mother Rita (Saoirse Ronan) readies her 9-year-old son, George (Elliott Heffernan), with a tattered suitcase. They live with her father, Gerald (Paul Weller), a doting man who radiates kindness and compassion; he’s the piano player. Fleeting flashbacks establish the tight bond between these three, and the deep love that Rita and George share.
She’s shattered. Ronan’s stricken expression is heartbreaking, her eyes clenched, in order to prevent tears.
George, on the other hand, is furious. He absolutely doesn’t want to leave, refuses to understand why he should, and feels betrayed when his mother resolutely hustles him to the train station.
“I hate you!” he snaps, pain in his face, as he breaks from her and runs into a train car. When she spies him through a window, as the train pulls away, he refuses to meet her gaze as she implores him to say a proper goodbye.
What follows is powered by two phenomenal performances, from Ronan and young Heffernan, both so solidly “in character” that we soon forget we’re watching actors; they become Rita and George.
As the train proceeds, McQueen hits us with the jolt we’ve been dreading ... because George is a mixed-race child. Two loutish boys in the seat behind lean over; one runs his fingers through George’s “unusual” hair. Heeding his grandfather’s advice about bullies, George stands up to them ... and they retreat in embarrassed silence.
“All mouth, and no trousers,” George scoffs, recalling his grandfather’s words.
(Love that expression!)
In the next few minutes, to the astonishment of a sympathetic little girl in the facing seat, George demonstrates that he has massive trousers ... when he tosses his suitcase out a window and jumps off the train. No way he’s going to an uncertain destination; come hell or high water, he’s returning to his East London home.
McQueen’s subsequent, old-school approach has the episodic atmosphere of David Copperfield or numerous other Charles Dickens novels, as George subsequently navigates a series of encounters over the next several days. Cinematographer Yorick Le Saux frequently places his camera low, to emphasize the child’s-eye view of what occurs.
McQueen never hammers his story’s racial element; neither does he ignore it. And while George’s plight initially doeshave a mildly larkish, boyishly exhilarating tone — particularly when he links up with three brothers who also “escaped,” because they were destinated to be separated upon arrival — events soon turn increasingly grim.
He is, after all, a little boy on his own amid frightening events; the bravado with which he made his initial decision soon fades, and his posture becomes uncertain, his eyes occasionally frightened. Heffernan’s nuanced performance is sublime; even when close to feeling overwhelmed, George is brave and defiant, at times even mischievous.
Back in London, the oblivious Rita goes about her daily job among the many other women toiling in a munitions factory. This is an amazing setting by production designer Adam Stockhausen, who appears to have stepped back in time and built a genuinely working factory; we also get a sense of how damned dangerous this environment is, amid machines that could cripple a clumsy or unwary individual within seconds.
Rita is well-liked, and one of the favored employees: both because she works hard, and also puts an uplifting face on the factory, by singing a song when a BBC crew arrives for a “keep the British end up” spot. We also realize — again, McQueen never hammers the points he intends — that England was able to endure because of women such as Rita and her friends: Tilda (Hayley Squires), Doris (Erin Kellyman) and Agnes (Sally Messham).
The three women are solidly sketched, as is true of all characters in this film.
Knowing that Rita grieves her son’s departure, her friends try to cheer her up after hours; she also is noticed by a quiet, gentle-faced firefighter named Jack (Harris Dickinson). But as subsequent flashbacks reveal, George’s departure isn’t the only tragedy in Rita’s life; she continues to be plagued by memories of his father.
Other key characters include the marvelous Ife (Benjamin Clémentine), a compassionate Air Raid Precautions (ARP) warden who chances upon the boy, while making his rounds and politely insisting that lights-out policies be followed. Clémentine delivers a powerful blend of dignity, sensitivity and firmness; Ife also gets the film’s best short speech.
Stephen Graham and Kathy Burke are creepily macabre as a pair of looters, in a sequence — speaking of Dickens — that feels lifted from Oliver Twist.
Other moments — some casual and matter-of-fact — elicit disbelief, as when subway guards, apparently following some inane protocol, refuse to allow frightened people to shelter within, during a bombing raid. As a further sign of the times, these working-class citizens don’t become an angry mob, hearkening back to a time when people were more polite and obedient.
Another subway sequence becomes this film’s major set-piece, and it’s a corker.
And we wonder, as this saga proceeds, how it will conclude ... and what will happen when — or even if — Rita learns that George didn’t reach his intended destination.
McQueen and editor Peter Sciberras maintain a mounting level of tension and suspense in this superb, character-driven drama. Over time, numerous great films have focused on the Blitz — Atonement and The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp come to mind, in addition to Hope and Glory — and I’m certain this one will join their ranks.
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