Mark.Kermode's.Secrets.Of.Cinema.S02e02.[British.History.Movies]
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00:00If the movies teach us anything about Britain, it's that we're not afraid of a fight.
00:28And when it comes to winning awards, we have one trusty weapon, our history.
00:33From Queen Elizabeth, to Queen Victoria, to the Queen, to Queen, each period of British
00:40history has its own distinctive characters, themes and cinematic flavour which are irresistible
00:45for directors, actors and audiences alike.
00:49In Secrets of Cinema, I explore the conventions which underwrite the movies we love the most
00:54and examine the techniques filmmakers use to keep us coming back for more.
00:58Tonight, I'm taking on nothing less than the history of Britain, as seen on the big screen.
01:24History is the quintessential British film genre.
01:41America may have the great outdoors for westerns and road movies, and teeming cities for cop
01:46and crime dramas, but Britain, well.
01:49Britain has seen off the Romans, been ruled by Tudors and Stuarts, built and then lost
01:53an empire and fought all the way through two world wars.
01:57And there's more than enough in all of that to provide a bottomless well of story material
02:01long after you've run out of Marvel comics and computer games to adapt.
02:08British history has always been an exportable commodity.
02:12Consider two films made nearly 90 years apart.
02:21In 1932, the Hungarian Alexander Korda cast Charles Lawton in The Private Life of Henry
02:27VIII and produced the first British talkie to make a significant dent in the American
02:32box office with its mix of class and vulgarity.
02:41Lawton won the Best Actor Oscar for his turn as the Royal Glutton, famously tearing into
02:46chicken with his bare hands, and running through wives the way he ran through numerous
03:00multi-course feasts.
03:16In 2018, Greek director Iorgos Lanthimos cast Olivia Colman as Queen Anne in The Favourite,
03:22and Colman went on to take home a Best Actress Oscar as the lonely, frustrated and capricious
03:26queen shifting her affections from one companion slash lover to another.
03:45These films appealed internationally because they show British royals at their best and
03:49their worst, larger than life, surrounded by pomp and magnificence, but with a common
03:55touch.
03:56Many historical films are filled with howling inaccuracies, Braveheart is a prime example,
04:02but facts aren't really the point.
04:05These are works of entertainment based on what might, or might not, have actually happened.
04:13And that storytelling freedom attracts filmmakers of all nationalities.
04:18From action and adventure to political intrigue, British history encompasses a remarkable range
04:24of styles and situations.
04:27Each period is almost a genre in itself, with its own particular themes and characters.
04:35In this programme, I'll be largely avoiding literary adaptations like Austen and Dickens.
04:40After all, they wrote stories set in their own present rather than the past.
04:44But what I am going to do is to look at some of the best films about British historical
04:49events, real and imagined, in the order of when they're actually set.
04:54So let's begin a little over 2,000 years ago.
05:05And this is the ancient British settlement of Cockium in Cornovii.
05:10The events of Britain on the eve of the Roman invasion are few and far between, which is
05:14all the more reason to value Carrion Cleo, as well as for its historical accuracy, obviously.
05:20Well, I must excuse my wife, she's not quite herself.
05:22Her poor old mother was eaten by a brontosaurus a few days ago.
05:25Oh, that was too bad.
05:26Yes, you're right.
05:27Brontosaurus died within the hour.
05:30But Carrion Cleo perfectly nails a recurring theme about the period.
05:36What a country.
05:38If you're a Roman, Britain is a miserable place with miserable weather.
05:43Now that the fighting was over, there were very few of them who were not eager to get
05:50back to the sunny shores and farms of Italy.
05:53They're still moaning a hundred years later.
05:55Bloody country.
05:57Get out of my land here!
05:59Hammer Films' Viking Queen isn't Viking at all.
06:02It's set in Roman times, but it features key character types that we'll see again in British
06:07history films.
06:08The pagan mystic obsessed with national destiny, and the warrior queen who embodies the nation.
06:14By the powers vested in me by Dis and Zeus, do hereby charge you, Selina Queen of the
06:20Iceni, before the sacred mistletoe and the golden sigil, to lead your people wisely.
06:28Released in 1967, the Viking Queen now looks bracingly ahead of its time with its female-led
06:33action sequences.
06:39But more recent films set in Roman Britain tend to focus on Roman rather than local heroes,
06:45such as Michael Fassbender's Quintus Dias in Centurion, whose voiceover sets the scene
06:50with the usual complaints.
06:53Two years on the frontier.
06:56This place is the arsehole of the world.
06:59Even the land wants us dead.
07:03Fassbender's weary narration echoes another film about a great military power bogged down
07:08far from home.
07:10Saigon.
07:11Shit.
07:12I'm still only in Saigon.
07:19Francis Ford Coppola's Vietnam fable is also evoked by The Eagle.
07:25It opens with a shot of Channing Tatum's hero heading up a misty river, as if towards a
07:30British heart of darkness.
07:38Venturing beyond civilisation, crossing a frontier into the dangerous unknown, is a
07:43key trope.
07:44In The Eagle, that frontier is visibly defined by Hadrian's Wall.
07:48So as well as echoing war movies, films set in Roman Britain reflect another enduring
07:53genre about a frontier, the Western.
07:59You can see the parallels in their imagery.
08:05The Eagle even pays homage to the closing shot of John Ford's The Searchers, clearly
08:10acknowledging its debt to the Western.
08:20The Romans are barely out the door when another lot of intruders come along, and this bunch
08:25couldn't care less about the weather.
08:27In The Vikings, the emphasis is again on the invaders as they attack 9th century Northumbria.
08:48Britain, or more specifically Anglo-Saxon England, needs a hero.
08:53Consider David Hemmings as Alfred, brother of King Æthelred, only rather than see off
08:59the Vikings, he'd prefer to enjoy the glories of Christian Rome.
09:17How Alfred becomes Alfred the Great is the theme of Clive Donner's coming-of-age tale,
09:22charting his journey from pious prig to wise sovereign.
09:26Some of the plot is historically based, such as the Vikings overrunning much of the M4 corridor.
09:36But when Alfred hits his lowest point, we find ourselves in more mythical territory.
09:41Falling in with a bunch of forest-dwelling outlaws, Alfred regains his mojo when a mysterious
09:47mute woman hands him back his sword.
09:50It's a gesture clearly reminiscent of England's greatest national legend.
09:58No other story nominally set in Britain gives filmmakers as much scope to let their imaginations
10:04run wild as that of King Arthur.
10:08Freed from even a semblance of historical accuracy, John Borman's operatic Excalibur
10:14gives us luminous knights in shining armour, and a fine forest-dwelling pagan mystic in
10:21Nicole Williamson's Merlin.
10:26While Monty Python and the Holy Grail delivers nothing less than God, as designed by Terry
10:31Gilliam, with the face of W.G. Grace and the voice of Graham Chapman.
10:38Arthur. Arthur. King of the Britons.
10:45Oh, don't grovel. One thing I can't stand, it's people grovelling.
10:49Sorry.
10:50And don't apologise. Every time I try to talk to someone, it's sorry this and forgive me
10:54that and I'm not worthy.
10:57Compare the profusion of movies about the mythical Arthur with the dearth of ones about
11:01the actual William the Conqueror and the defeat of the Saxons in 1066, but the impact of the
11:07Norman conquests will still be felt in the next great era of British history films.
11:22Medieval Britain is a veritable Olympics of action. Dueling, jousting, archery, more dueling,
11:31with wooden staffs on a log, swinging from ropes and swinging from ropes.
11:37But medieval movies repeatedly remind us that the most important contests are battles of
11:42personality.
11:43The die is cast, Thomas. Make the most of it. And if I know you, I'm sure you will.
11:51Set in the 1160s, a century after the Norman invasion, Beckett is the story of a high-powered
11:57bromance.
11:59England is a ship. The king is the captain of the ship.
12:03That's neat. I like that.
12:06Richard Burton's Thomas Beckett is the close confidant and fixer of Peter O'Toole's King
12:11Henry II, but he's a Saxon and he's a Norman. Well, you can see where this is going.
12:18When you Normans invaded England, you seized our Saxon land, burned our Saxon homes, raped
12:22our Saxon sisters. Naturally, you hate Saxons.
12:28And around the ten-minute mark, as if straight out of a screenwriting 101 class, we're explicitly
12:34told the film's central theme.
12:36How do you combine the two, my lord? Honor and collaboration.
12:43I don't try. I love good living, and good living is Norman. I love life, and a Saxon's
12:48only birthright is to be slaughtered. One collaborates to live.
12:53But all it takes is for Beckett to be made Archbishop of Canterbury, and he's having
12:58second thoughts.
13:00I cannot allow any of my clergy to be thrown into prison and tried by the civil authorities.
13:04Neither can I stand by and let my priests be murdered.
13:07You? You can't allow? You can't stand by? Are you taking yourself seriously as archbishop?
13:15The bromance is off, and before long, it's murder on the cathedral floor.
13:24Incidentally, Peter O'Toole himself told me that Jean Anouilh, who wrote the play from
13:30which Beckett was adapted, did negligible historical research and based the lead characters
13:34on two sparring actors in his theatre company.
13:38Come for me!
13:42Peter O'Toole reprised his role as Henry II in The Lion in Winter, set 13 years after
13:47the events of Beckett. It's December 1183, and the royal family gather at Henry's castle
13:53in France to thrash out the plans for his succession.
13:57Ah, Christmas. Warm and rosy time. The hot wine steams, the yule log roars, and we're
14:04the fat that's in the fire. She'll be here soon, you know.
14:07Who?
14:08Mother.
14:09This time, Henry's love-hate power struggle is with his estranged wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine,
14:16played by an Oscar-winning Catherine Hepburn. Eleanor makes an impressive arrival by barge,
14:22the Learjet of the era, to a glamorous John Barry soundtrack.
14:26What would you have me do? Give out? Give up? Give in?
14:33Give me a little peace.
14:35A little? Why so modest? How about eternal peace? Now there's a thought.
14:41So, we've got a seasonal setting, complete with tree, presents, and passive aggression.
14:47Yes, it's a medieval version of that classic scenario, The Family Christmas.
14:52To Henry. Heavy. It's my tombstone. Eleanor, you've spoiled me.
15:00After Henry II's death, British history films shift gear from internal royal struggles to
15:05a much more classic conflict between power and the people. And it's at this point that
15:10one of our greatest heroes enters the scene, even though he probably never actually existed.
15:19Who is this? This?
15:22Sir Robin of Loxley, Your Highness.
15:24Just as Errol Flynn's Robin Hood embodies the man of the people,
15:28Basil Rathbone's Guy of Gisborne represents the corrupt establishment.
15:33What's the matter, Gisborne? Run out of hangings?
15:36I know a ripe subject for one.
15:38And we can watch them literally fight it out.
15:43The Adventures of Robin Hood transmutes British history into pure golden age of Hollywood entertainment.
15:49There's glorious technicolour, a rich score by Eric Wolfgang Korngold,
15:58and no buckler left unswashed.
16:04I shall never fear my father's sword.
16:08Really?
16:13Now we're even.
16:16In 1991's Prince of Thieves, Robin's nemesis is the Sheriff of Nottingham.
16:26And while Kevin Costner ultimately wins the fight, Alan Rickman steals the film.
16:31Just a minute.
16:33Robin Hood steals money from my pocket, forcing me to hurt the public.
16:39And they love him for it?
16:42Yes.
16:44No more merciful beheadings.
16:47And call off Christmas.
16:49Robin Hood is, of course, the best-known incarnation of a figure we've already met,
16:53the forest-dwelling outlaw.
16:55And unusually for the movies,
16:57Costner's Sherwood Forest actually looks like it was filmed in Britain.
17:01Because it was.
17:03Unlike Errol Flynn's clearly Californian Sherwood.
17:09I'll race you.
17:11Or the Sherwood in Richard Lester's Robin and Marion, which was filmed in Spain.
17:18You sure?
17:20Of course I'm sure.
17:22Originally titled The Death of Robin Hood,
17:24Robin and Marion is effectively a sequel to the traditional narrative.
17:28Sonny Sherwood aside, this must be one of the most autumnal films ever made.
17:32Weary and disillusioned by years fighting for Richard the Lionheart,
17:36Connery's middle-aged Robin returns to England
17:39to rekindle his relationship with Audrey Hepburn's Marion.
17:42You had the sweetest body when you left.
17:47Hard and not a mark.
17:51And you were mine.
17:54I've never kissed a member of the clergy.
17:57Would it be a sin?
17:59Played by Connery with a remarkable lack of vanity,
18:02this Robin is well past his heroic prime.
18:11Robin and Marion is a rare film that depicts a hero in decline
18:15rather than ending his story at the height of his success.
18:19But the truth is that in British history,
18:22real outlaws and rebels rarely fare well.
18:29I shall tell you of William Wallace.
18:33Historians from England will say I am a liar.
18:36But history is written by those who have hanged heroes.
18:41Mel Gibson's Braveheart takes us to late 13th century Scotland
18:45following an English invasion.
18:47Now it's not just Sherwood Forest
18:49but an entire country ripe for state-sponsored pillage.
18:53As Lord of these lands, I will bless this marriage
18:56by taking the bride into my bed on the first night of her union.
19:01Oh, by God, you will not!
19:04We're fully onside by the time Gibson's blue-woaded William Wallace
19:08stages his epic rebellion with an accent as wobbly as his sword.
19:12You've come to fight as free men.
19:15And free men you are!
19:17History dictates that this hero has to die,
19:20but in doing so, he becomes the very thing Gibson loves best, a martyr.
19:25Wallace's morbidly protracted torture and execution
19:28is like a trial run for Gibson's subsequent Passion of the Christ.
19:40Never one for subtlety, Gibson gives Braveheart a chance
19:44to pantomime baddie in the form of Patrick McGowan's
19:47English king Edward I.
19:49Tell me, what advice would you offer on the present situation?
19:57Although it has to be said, he has plenty of competition
20:00in a medieval royal rogues' gallery
20:03that also includes Richard Harris's Richard the Lionheart.
20:06But Robin judges me.
20:08He always does. A peasant bastard.
20:11Paul Giamatti's King John.
20:13And we are forced to sign your precious Magna Carta!
20:17Forced by you!
20:19And Vincent Price's Richard III.
20:23Perhaps a taste of the rack would be more to the lovely ladies
20:27like Ingelder.
20:29But what if you're not a rebel or a royal?
20:32As far as the movies are concerned, the main job of ordinary
20:35medieval Brits is to be exploited by their unscrupulous overlords.
20:39But England's most famous medieval writer suggests
20:42that everyday life is where the real action is.
20:47Adapted from Chaucer by Pier Paolo Pasolini in 1972,
20:51The Canterbury Tales is an Italian production filmed in Britain.
20:55It's so bawdy that even Robin Asquith makes an appearance.
20:59You're on double time!
21:01But once you get beyond the terrible dubbing
21:04and Ziggy Stardust costumes,
21:06the atmospheric British locations and often gargoyle-like cast
21:10make The Canterbury Tales a vivid and immediate evocation
21:14of a distant age.
21:18Even a vision of hell with Satan farting monks out of his backside
21:22is authentic Chaucer.
21:24You get a sense that The Canterbury Tales is the one medieval film
21:28that a medieval audience might actually recognise.
21:37When it comes to movies about the Tudor period,
21:40there's one simple rule.
21:42Don't lose your head.
21:48It's A Lesson Learned the Hard Way by Thomas More,
21:51counsellor to Henry VIII in Fred Zinnaman's A Man For All Seasons.
21:55Robert Bolt's script keeps Henry tantalisingly off screen,
21:59while the film builds up a picture of Tudor political machinations.
22:04Sir Thomas is here, Your Grace.
22:06Sir Thomas?
22:07Master Cromwell.
22:09Paul Schofield's More has to avoid being sucked into the schemes
22:13of Orson Welles' Cardinal Thomas Wolsey
22:16and Leo McCurn's Thomas Cromwell.
22:18Yes, that is a lot of Thomases to keep across.
22:23Why did you oppose me?
22:25I thought Your Grace was wrong.
22:29A matter of conscience.
22:32You're a constant regret to me, Thomas.
22:35If you could just see facts flat on
22:38without that horrible moral squint.
22:42The film builds up such an atmosphere of intrigue mixed with dread
22:47that by the time Robert Shaw's King finally shows up
22:51half an hour into the movie, we don't quite know what to expect.
22:55Ha-ha!
22:57Ha-ha-ha!
23:00Ha-ha-ha!
23:06More's downfall is his refusal to support Henry's break
23:09with the Catholic Church so he can annul his first marriage
23:12and wed Anne Boleyn.
23:14It's a crisis of conscience that calls to mind another Thomas
23:18and another Henry four centuries earlier.
23:21And if this be not enough to keep a man alive,
23:24then in good faith I long not to live.
23:29A Man For All Seasons captures a recurring theme
23:32in British history movies.
23:34It can be risky to get close to the monarch
23:36and the closer you are, the riskier it can get.
23:39The private life of Henry VIII opens with a picture
23:42of everyday life in Henry's reign.
23:44A typical morning getting ready for another beheading.
23:47And lined up for the chop today is Anne Boleyn.
23:51Isn't it a pity to lose a head like this?
23:54Still, they will easily find a nickname for me.
23:57Anne Boleyn's of England, actually. Anne sans tête.
24:01Director Alexander Corder also makes us wait for Henry's entrance
24:05and when Charles Lawton's king appears,
24:07it's just like a Holbein portrait coming to life.
24:12If I were not a king, what then?
24:16All right, ladies.
24:18Come here!
24:20And even while his second wife is moments away from execution,
24:23Henry is sizing up a future prospect.
24:27Catherine Howard, if it please Your Majesty.
24:33It does, Catherine!
24:35It does!
24:37But Henry reveals his own vulnerability
24:40in the film's most telling moment
24:42when he addresses his newborn, longed-for son.
24:45Through tears and cruelty and pain, you came into the world.
24:49And by the same road, you'll reach the throne.
24:52And by the same road, hold it.
24:57And that painful struggle to hold the throne is a constant theme
25:01in films about Henry's daughter, Elizabeth I.
25:06Sheikah Kapoor's Elizabeth depicts the first few years of her reign
25:10as she tries to establish her position
25:12surrounded by men who think they know better.
25:15Madam, we must with all haste raise an army to march upon Scotland.
25:19Can... Can...
25:26Can we not send emissaries to...
25:28There is no time for that!
25:30As Queen, we look to you for action,
25:32unless you are content to wait for the French to send more reinforcements.
25:37No! No!
25:39Elizabeth quickly realises that if she can't swim, she'll sink.
25:43Kapoor's daughter, Elizabeth,
25:45Kapoor quickly realises that if she can't swim, she'll sink.
25:48Kapoor's prowling camera captures the claustrophobic atmosphere of menace
25:52as the film builds inexorably to a climax
25:55that echoes that of The Godfather.
25:57While Elizabeth is at prayer, her various enemies are taken out.
26:02What is the meaning of this?
26:06Your Grace is arrested.
26:08You must go with these men to the tower.
26:10But there's another deeply fascinating aspect to Elizabeth's life.
26:14It's a coming-of-age story, a tale of transformation.
26:18Elizabeth decides that in her weakness as an unmarried woman
26:22lies her strength.
26:24She becomes the Virgin Queen, something superhuman,
26:28even adopting a kind of mask and costume
26:31in a scene that echoes the superhero genre.
26:44Many actors have jumped at the chance
26:46to play both young Elizabeth and Super Elizabeth.
26:57Have a care with my name, you will wear it out.
27:00Super Elizabeth ushers in a new heroic age
27:03as England fends off invasion by the Spanish Armada.
27:07Two films made 70 years apart
27:09capture the Queen rousing her troops at Tilbury,
27:12a real event for which she actually did armour up.
27:15I am resolved in the midst and heat of the battle
27:18to live or die amongst you all!
27:23I know I have the body of a weak and feeble woman,
27:26but I have the heart and valour of a king.
27:29Whether it's Cate Blanchett or Flora Robson,
27:32Elizabeth seems to be channelling the kind of warrior queen figure
27:35we last saw in the Roman era.
27:37By your peace in camp and your valour in the field,
27:40we shall shortly have a famous victory!
27:43But in Scotland, things look rather different.
27:46Elizabeth is a more compromised figure
27:48in Josie Rourke's Mary, Queen of Scots.
27:51This encounter between the royal cousins, by the way,
27:54is a classic piece of dramatic licence
27:56Elizabeth and Mary never met in real life.
28:00Do not play into their hands.
28:02Our enmity is precisely what they hope for.
28:06I know your heart has more within it than the men who counsel you.
28:15I am more man than woman now.
28:19The throne has made me so.
28:27The Tudor era gets a spectacular send-off in Anonymous,
28:31courtesy of director Roland Emmerich of Independence Day fame,
28:35with the typical bombast,
28:37Emmerich stages Elizabeth's funeral procession on a frozen Thames,
28:41another piece of filmmaking licence.
28:44Oh, God, bless this crown and sanctify King James of Scotland
28:49now and forevermore as King James I of England,
28:54Scotland, Wales and Ireland.
28:58And while the preceding 16 centuries of British history
29:02lacked bloodshed and brutality,
29:05once we reach the Stuart era,
29:07films take a particularly disturbing turn.
29:13God save the King!
29:15God save the King!
29:24A war against whom, Mr Roughton?
29:27Against the King, sir.
29:30The King?
29:32You mean a civil war?
29:35In England?
29:37We surely do.
29:39The Civil War is the defining event of 17th century England
29:42and it shapes pretty much every film set in this period.
29:45We're given the most straightforward account of the war
29:48in one of the grandest British historical epics,
29:51Cromwell, directed by Ken Hughes.
29:53Richard Harris is a commanding Cromwell
29:55and he gives good glower during the film's lengthy Parliament scenes.
29:59But it's Alec Guinness' dignified, stammering Charles I
30:03who steals the show.
30:05Mr Speaker, you will inform the members of this House
30:09that their presence is no longer required by the nation.
30:13This Parliament is, by my authority,
30:17terminated, dissolved.
30:21The film's grandeur owes much to the cinematography of Geoffrey Unsworth,
30:26who also shot 2001 and Superman.
30:30Unsworth composes masterly images,
30:33whether the battles are on the fields of Edge Hill and Naseby
30:37or round a table in Westminster.
30:39In the name of God, what are we all?
30:44Men?
30:47Cowering and quivering like downtrodden serfs.
30:53The King is not England!
30:57We know the King's doomed,
30:59but the film still conveys the shock of his execution.
31:11SCREAMING
31:17The head of a traitor!
31:21But the most unnerving moment comes barely ten minutes in
31:25when we see a man who's been mutilated for challenging the authorities.
31:31Oh, my God!
31:33Oh, my God!
31:36Oh, my God!
31:41Oh, my God!
31:43Oh, my God!
31:49In a movie that largely concentrates on the big historical players,
31:53this scene reminds us how desperate life must have been
31:56for ordinary people during the Civil War.
32:02God damn this King!
32:08And one film captures the sheer horror of the time like no other.
32:14SCREAMING
32:17Set in 1645, Witchfinder General is the story of Matthew Hopkins,
32:22who roams the East Anglian countryside with his henchmen.
32:26Remember, John Stern, you ride with me only because you help me in my work.
32:30You call it work? The Lord's work. A noble thing.
32:33And a profitable one, the good Lord paying in silver for every hanging.
32:37Hopkins and Stern take advantage of the chaos created by the Civil War
32:41to inflict their highly profitable witch-hunting scam on the gullible locals.
32:47I trust you know the old man? Better than anyone.
32:50In private talk, you may shed some light on his innocence.
32:54Private? Yes, away from the distraction of the crowds.
32:58Perhaps in the quiet of your room tonight
33:00you might be able to help me prove him guiltless.
33:03Aside from the splendidly venal price,
33:06the film's great glory is its sense of place.
33:09Director Michael Reeves makes extensive use of authentic East Anglian locations.
33:15And when good guy Ian Ogilvie saddles up to ride across the countryside,
33:19Witchfinder General truly captures the spirit of a Western,
33:23albeit a Western set in East Anglia.
33:26It's a brief respite from this most claustrophobic and grim of British horror films.
33:42Madness runs throughout a much more recent film set during the Civil War,
33:46but it's not the kind of film you'd expect to see in a British film.
33:51Madness runs throughout a much more recent film set during the Civil War,
33:55Ben Wheatley's A Field In England.
33:58Shot in stripped-down monochrome,
34:00it's a hallucinatory account of an alchemist's assistant,
34:03played by Rhys Shearsmith,
34:05who runs into some stray soldiers while fleeing a battle.
34:08After ingesting psychotropic mushrooms,
34:10the ragtag quartet come under the power of Michael Smiley's sinister treasure seeker.
34:16We shall venture to continental Europe when the opportunity arises.
34:19When the opportunity arises.
34:24I've had little success in applying the master's arts.
34:27Been looking for anything of great worth.
34:33Which is why I've conjured you.
34:35The film is full of disorientating narrative leaps and unsettling images.
34:42Moments when the action stops and the characters are shown in tableau vivant,
34:47their poses suggesting a hidden, impenetrable meaning.
34:55And for me, one of the most disturbing images in recent British cinema,
34:59when Smiley turns Shearsmith into a kind of human metal detector.
35:05MUSIC PLAYS
35:13Clearly, there's not much joy or glory to be found in the Civil War era,
35:18but films about it tend to be bold and memorable,
35:22and something tells me there'll be more movies to come from this divided period.
35:35MUSIC STOPS
35:38With all that nasty Civil War business out of the way,
35:41it's time to let our hair down, or put our big hair on,
35:46chill out to some Baroque music
35:49and hang out in a stately home shot by Stanley Kubrick,
35:53or a stately home shot like Stanley Kubrick.
35:56That's the dream anyway, because the big theme of films about this period
36:00is people making their way in the world,
36:02seeking wealth and status, often by any means necessary.
36:06I like danger.
36:08I believe you do.
36:11Few characters embody this better
36:13than one of British cinema's great anti-heroes,
36:16Margaret Lockwood's Barbara Worth.
36:18Think of the exhilaration, the excitement and the danger.
36:22Once a man has taken to the road, everything else must seem tame and insipid.
36:26The Wicked Lady looks like a costume melodrama,
36:29but Barbara is as hard-boiled as the toughest femme fatale.
36:33Aboard Nobleman's Wife, who becomes a highwayman,
36:36she saddles up and grabs the gun herself.
36:41Hold! I know that I shoot to kill!
36:44We're back in outlaw territory, although, unlike Robin Hood,
36:48Barbara and James Mason's Captain Jackson
36:51are ruthlessly in it for themselves.
36:55But they do it with panache and remarkable sexual frankness.
37:00I've not deceived my husband yet.
37:02Then it's time you began.
37:04The careless fool deserves all he gets.
37:06One moment. What of the jewels and the money?
37:09Keep them. I can be generous if you can.
37:12I like to drive a hard bargain.
37:16So do I.
37:20Let's shoot something.
37:25There's more female gunplay and corseted intrigue
37:28from Emma Stone and Rachel Weisz,
37:31rivals for royal affection in The Favourite.
37:37Throw!
37:42You're really doing damage to the sky.
37:44Can I ask you something?
37:46As long as you're aware that I have a gun.
37:48You should know I've canvassed my party.
37:50They're waiting for us to announce an attempt at peace.
37:53Weisz's Lady Sarah keeps men at a distance from Queen Anne,
37:57whether on matters of politics...
38:00Might I remind you, you're not the Queen.
38:02You sent me to speak for her. She is unwell.
38:05What says she?
38:06That Harley is a fop and a prat
38:08and smells like a 96-year-old French horse for Juju.
38:11..or matters of pleasure.
38:18Life has changed from the blood-soaked courts of Anne's predecessors
38:22We're no longer one step away from the executioner's axe,
38:25removing the sense of existential dread,
38:28even if the scheming is as intense as ever.
38:32We're also looking at an altogether more human Queen.
38:36Olivia Colman's Anne is overweight and depressed,
38:39riddled with gout and grieving for 17 lost children.
38:44Some were born as blood.
38:46Some without breath.
38:49And some were with me for a very brief time.
38:53While the original script was properly researched,
38:56director Yorgos Lanthimos and Olivia Colman specifically stated
39:00that they cared less for history and everything for character.
39:04The sense of modernist absurdity is emphasised
39:07by Robbie Ryan's cinematography,
39:09which uses wide-angle lenses to bend the corners of Anne's palace
39:13in a manner that's part dream, part nightmare,
39:16somehow sealed off from the real world outside.
39:20Britain beyond the palace gates
39:22is captured in its rough and dirty glory in Tom Jones.
39:26Adapted from Henry Fielding's picaresque novel,
39:29the film sees Albert Finney's low-born foundling
39:32embark on an 18th-century road trip to seek his fortune.
39:37Even more openly lusty than The Wicked Lady,
39:40Tom Jones was the first ex-certificate British film
39:43to win a Best Picture Oscar.
39:46Director Tony Richardson and cinematographer Walter Lassally
39:51were part of the British new wave of the early 1960s.
39:56He's got him!
39:59And their loose, irreverent style shook up
40:02the often-stayed traditions of the period drama.
40:05Tom's journey takes him across the country,
40:08and his path might have crossed with that of another fortune-seeker
40:12whose travels lead him much further afield.
40:16Based on a William Makepeace Thackeray novel,
40:19Stanley Kubrick's Barry Lyndon follows Ryan O'Neill's Redmond Barry
40:23from 1750s Ireland to the gilded palaces of Europe
40:27via the Seven Years' War.
40:32Good morning, Redmond. Good morning, Captain Pottsdorf.
40:35Five years in the army,
40:38and some considerable experience of the world,
40:42had by now dispelled any of those romantic notions regarding love
40:47with which Barry commenced life.
40:49Kubrick uses his films to build worlds,
40:52and Barry Lyndon has to be one of the most fully realised,
40:56marshalling costumes and locations to stunning effect.
41:00Several of its images are inspired by 18th-century paintings,
41:04and there's Kubrick's fabled use of camera lenses developed by NASA
41:08to ensure that he could shoot by candlelight.
41:14And, of course, music is crucial in establishing the setting.
41:21Leonard Rosenman's adaptation of period pieces won him an Oscar.
41:30CLOCK TICKS
41:3818th-century Britain looks like a great place to be
41:41if you're a man with money,
41:43but Britain's wealth was built on something all too rarely explored
41:47in films about the period, slavery.
41:50She is black. She is my blood.
41:53But she is black. A detail you chose not to share with us.
41:57Which is all the more reason to celebrate Belle,
42:00Amara Santi's powerful and gently subversive romantic melodrama.
42:05Dido Elizabeth Belle is the illegitimate daughter
42:08of a Royal Navy captain and an enslaved African woman.
42:12She ends up being raised by her great-uncle, Lord Mansfield,
42:16England's Lord Chief Justice.
42:19The film is inspired by a real-life painting
42:22and what little is known of the title character.
42:26Gugu Mbatha-Raw's Dido must find her way in a society
42:29where she's disadvantaged by both her colour and her gender.
42:33Must not a lady marry, even if she is financially secure?
42:39Who is she without a husband of consequence?
42:42It seems silly, like a free negro who begs for a master.
42:47The film's major subplot is a case over which Lord Mansfield presides,
42:52describing the deliberate drowning of slaves at sea.
42:55Ironically, it's an insurance claim.
42:58Human rights are secondary to financial compensation.
43:02Silence!
43:03It is not legal to discharge lives from a ship into the waters
43:10to facilitate insurance compensation.
43:14Whether they be the lives of horses or human beings,
43:20slaves or otherwise.
43:23It is not legal...
43:28..neither is it right.
43:31Struggles against injustice and exploitation
43:34will loom large in the coming century.
43:38MUSIC PLAYS
43:46Perhaps the most panoramic depiction of early 19th-century Britain
43:51is one of the most recent, Mike Lee's Peterloo,
43:54made to mark the 200th anniversary of the infamous massacre.
43:58Lee juggles and juxtaposes a remarkable range of voices
44:02from impoverished cotton mill workers...
44:05I don't blame you for losing hope, Mum.
44:07I haven't lost hope, son. I'll never lose hope.
44:10At times, it's too hard to lose hope. Hope's all we've got.
44:14They must be removed forthwith. I concur.
44:17..to an unholy coalition of establishment figures
44:20determined to crack down on protesters.
44:23The rabble must be awed into submission.
44:27A mere show of military might
44:29would soon see them gambling like little lambs back to their looms.
44:34The slow build-up takes more than two hours,
44:37but it pays off with the film's overwhelming climax
44:40as cavalry charge the peaceful protesters.
44:43Lee dispenses with music to give the massacre a news-like immediacy.
44:52There's an echo of the Peterloo massacre
44:55in the opening scene of Comrades, set in the early 1830s,
44:59after rural labourers destroy machinery
45:02they believe is putting them out of work.
45:14Notice how director Bill Douglas places his title card
45:17over a shot of the Cerne Abbas giant in Dorset,
45:20suggesting a timeless theme to the story.
45:26God is our guide.
45:30No swords we draw.
45:32The comrades of the title are the Toll Puddle Martyrs,
45:35whose efforts to form a workers' union
45:37lead to them being sentenced to transportation to Australia.
45:41Union, justice.
45:44Many films might have stopped at this point,
45:47but remarkably, Douglas actually follows the martyrs to Australia,
45:51where he unflinchingly depicts their harsh punishment.
45:54Water!
45:57Water!
46:01Little seen since its brief release in 1987,
46:04Comrades is a lost gem, and, like Peterloo,
46:08an uncomfortable corrective
46:10to the more deferential tendencies of historical cinema.
46:13God bless your Majesty.
46:18I do want to help them, whatever you say.
46:21And not just the labouring poor,
46:23but the hungry and the homeless.
46:25There are people who are lost,
46:27and whose business is it to see to their welfare?
46:30Well, in my experience, ma'am,
46:32it's best to let these things develop naturally.
46:35If you interfere, you risk overturning the card.
46:39Beneath the glamour, Emily Blunt's spirited young Queen Victoria
46:43is presented as a kind of anti-establishment rebel herself.
46:47In this shot, which owes much to the style of Spike Lee,
46:50Victoria is literally separated
46:52from the starchy, fussy spoilsports who surround her.
47:02But Victoria is also at the centre of the jingoistic images
47:06strikingly brought to life by animator Richard Williams
47:09in The Charge Of The Light Brigade.
47:11They capture a culture of complacency,
47:13unthinking patriotism and imperial arrogance.
47:18When it comes to Britain's imperial military ventures
47:21in Africa and South Asia,
47:23there's an interesting echo of films about the Roman era.
47:26Only this time, the Brits are the homesick intruders,
47:29and it's their turn to do the moaning.
47:32Ah, I'm here.
47:35Rogue, stressed.
47:37Take an Irishman and give his name to a rotten,
47:40stinking, middle-of-nowhere hole like this.
47:43Despite their vastly superior military technology,
47:46the British are often presented as heroic underdogs,
47:50threatened by a largely undifferentiated mass of locals.
47:54You think the Welsh can't do better than that, Owen?
47:57Well, they've got a very good base section, mine.
48:01But no top tenners, that's for sure.
48:04Zulu depicts the Battle of Rourke's Drift in 1879,
48:08when the British are forced to retreat
48:10Zulu depicts the Battle of Rourke's Drift in 1879,
48:14in which our plucky boys try to hold off and out-sing
48:18thousands of Zulu warriors.
48:21MAN SINGS
48:38Sing!
48:41Come on, sing!
48:55There's more singing from an outnumbered Brit in Gungerdeen.
48:59This time it's Cary Grant's Sergeant Archibald Cutter,
49:03surrounded by an Indian murder cult on the north-west frontier.
49:07Oi! Hey! Sing us a song, will you?
49:13Rather than military history,
49:15Gungerdeen is an adventure story with a swashbuckling flavour,
49:19which strongly influenced Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.
49:28And what of the so-called Empress of India herself?
49:32Well, the older Victoria hasn't shaken off the young Victoria's
49:36mildly rebellious tendencies.
49:40Recent years have seen the emergence
49:42of a highly specific history sub-genre,
49:45films in which the widowed Queen,
49:47who absolutely has to be played by Judi Dench,
49:50forms a close and slightly scandalous relationship
49:53with a non-English servant.
49:56In Mrs Brown, bizarrely known in the US as Her Majesty Mrs Brown,
50:01the upstart interloper is Billy Connolly's John Brown.
50:06Welcome, woman.
50:09Welcome.
50:12While in Victoria and Abdul,
50:14young Indian Muslim Abdul Kareem, played by Ali Fazal,
50:18gives the ageing Queen a different perspective on language and culture.
50:23Thank you, Abdul.
50:25You are an excellent teacher.
50:29Thank you, Abdul.
50:31You are an excellent teacher.
50:36Bertie! Mother!
50:38Were you spying on me?
50:40Were you learning Urdu? Yes, I was, as a matter of fact.
50:43You think that's entirely appropriate?
50:45Well, I'm Empress of India. What could be more appropriate?
50:48Victoria and Abdul encompasses the final years of Queen Victoria's life,
50:53a time which also saw the birth of cinema.
50:57From this point on, British history has frequently been caught on film
51:01as it actually happened.
51:03But, of course, that hasn't stopped us making history movies
51:06because they're about so much more than what actually happened.
51:09Now, let's conclude with a quick look
51:11at some of the key types of history films made in the modern era.
51:27Ever ridden in one? Rather. All the way to Epsom.
51:31One of the most ambitious and imaginative films
51:34about 20th century British history
51:36is Michael Powell and Emerick Pressburger's
51:38The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp.
51:40It follows its protagonist, Clive Wincandy,
51:43from the Boer War via the Great War
51:45to old age in the Home Guard during World War II,
51:48the time when the film was actually made.
51:51Does my knowledge count for nothing, eh?
51:53Experience, skill? You tell me.
51:57It is a different knowledge they need now, Clive.
52:01The enemy's different, so you have to be different too.
52:05Colonel Blimp is affectionate and quirkily patriotic,
52:08but it's also sufficiently satirical and sceptical
52:11that Winston Churchill reportedly tried to have it banned
52:14on the basis that it might be bad for wartime morale.
52:18What's that? A gun, sir. Brother's a gamekeeper.
52:21That's the ticket. Load with number four.
52:23We'll soon have rifles, tommy guns too.
52:25Do you know which end is which? Yes, sir.
52:28Colonel Blimp felt close to the bone
52:30because it explored a period of history
52:32that many of its audience had lived through themselves.
52:35Most of today's cinema-goers were born long after the 1940s,
52:39and perhaps we're prepared to allow films about the period
52:42much more dramatic licence.
52:44Churchill himself is the central figure
52:47in one of the most recent films about World War II, Darkest Hour.
52:51Here, Gary Oldman's Churchill plays a similar cinematic role
52:54to Elizabeth I or Queen Victoria,
52:56the national leader surrounded by scheming
52:59or, at best, misguided establishment figures.
53:02I propose... The only slipway is...
53:04Would you stop interrupting me while I am interrupting you?
53:11When I chose my war cabinet,
53:13I took great care to surround myself with old rivals.
53:18I may have overdone it.
53:20But he's reinvigorated by a trip on the underground
53:23where he encounters what's presented as authentic Britain.
53:26It's like a visit to the magical woods in Arthurian legend,
53:30and just as fanciful.
53:32Now, let me ask you this.
53:34If the worst came to pass and the enemy were to appear
53:39on those streets above, what would you do?
53:42Fight. Fight the fascists.
53:44Fight them with anything we can lay our hands on.
53:46Broom handles if we must. Straight by street.
53:49They'll never take Piccadilly!
53:54Released in the same year as Darkest Hour,
53:57Dunkirk sees British soldiers once again
54:00in the role of beleaguered underdogs.
54:03But it's also a very contemporary take on history,
54:06told through the multiple time frames
54:08that are a hallmark of director Christopher Nolan.
54:13One of ours, George.
54:16Both Dunkirk and Darkest Hour capture British power in crisis.
54:23And it's still the case that no-one embodies British power
54:26better than a British monarch.
54:28In The King's Speech, George VI struggles to overcome
54:32his vocal impediment and rally the nation
54:35at the start of World War II.
54:38While in The Queen, the death of Princess Diana in 1997
54:42puts the royal family under the spotlight.
54:49We're back to the archetype of the monarch as an embattled
54:52but sympathetic and very human figure,
54:55struggling to balance tradition with their responsibilities
54:59and their personal flaws.
55:01Oh, you beauty.
55:07In this grave...
55:11..I...
55:12It's got to be one of the most winning formulas in cinema.
55:15Colin Firth and Helen Mirren both followed in the footsteps
55:18of Charles Lawton's Henry VIII,
55:20bagging Oscars for their royal leading roles.
55:24We're still fascinated by our outlaws, too.
55:28Although their stomping ground tends to be the east end of London
55:31in the 1960s, rather than Sherwood Forest in the late 12th century.
55:35Phil Collins' great train robber Buster Edwards
55:38has plenty of man-of-the-people charm.
55:41It's a Royal Mail train.
55:43Carries a million quid on a bank holiday weekend.
55:46And we've got a nigget.
55:48One million quid.
55:51But charm isn't the first word that comes to mind
55:54with the Kray twins.
56:00Is this a joke?
56:02Do you see me laughing?
56:04Peter Madak's take on the Gangster Brothers
56:06starred Gary and Martin Kemp, pop stars like Phil Collins.
56:11The more recent legend, however,
56:13featured a digitally duplicated Tom Hardy,
56:16not known for his 1980s power ballads.
56:19I work for me.
56:21And you...
56:23You work for them.
56:39But pop music is the great cultural phenomenon
56:42of the post-war era.
56:44And as we saw in our Secrets of Cinema
56:46about coming of age,
56:49it's one of the most powerful ways of evoking a time and place.
56:53Look at the ecstatic music-driven scenes in Billy Elliot,
56:57set in County Durham during the miners' strike.
57:10Meanwhile, Gurinder Chadha's Blinded By The Light
57:13uses the songs of Bruce Springsteen
57:15to tell the story of a British-Pakistani family in Luton
57:18in the Thatcherite 80s.
57:20One, two, three, four!
57:30All of which brings us to an emerging trend
57:32in British history films, the pop biopic,
57:35which combines a nostalgic musical soundtrack
57:38and outlandish costumes
57:40with the rags-to-riches stories of a time
57:43with the rags-to-riches stories
57:45of a very modern kind of royalty, the rock star.
57:58And whether it's Freddie Mercury or Elton John,
58:02these films show outsiders
58:04rising to the heart of British cultural identity.
58:08It's a narrative that ultimately offers hope and reassurance,
58:13and it's a new national myth to add to all the others
58:17that run through the rich genre of British history films.
58:37MUSIC CONTINUES