Like all red-blooded American kids in denial, he refused to talk about it. We'd both grown up on a diet of fables like The Sands of Iwo Jima. He'd never seen anything critical of war, armies, or officers like this before. The Charge of the Light Brigade had been advertised with a splendid poster of a cavalryman with a saber, and promised to be a lavish update of the old Errol Flynn movie. But it was always mother-son bonding night, so Savant had to stay home and just hear about incredible screenings Cinerama Dome of 2001 and Ice Station Zebra from this really inarticulate friend. Savant's best-friend neighbor in 1968 had this mom that drove him all the way into Los Angeles to see new movies. The British have a surfeit of noble fighting men willing to die in battle, and they might have been capable of winning - if it were not for the appalling incompetence and arrogant idiocy of their officers. Cholera strikes the ranks as soon as they reach land, and when they come face-to-face with the orderly, battle-ready Russians on the plains of Balaclava, it's a miracle that the tough Scots infantry overwhelm the enemy during the first engagement. Duberly (Jill Bennett) come as well, getting in the way. Many wives and onlookers like nosy corps wife Mrs. The expeditionary force goes to the Crimea in a shockingly inept fleet packed with clerks and luxuries for the officers. A dinner-table trifle between them is blown up into the 'black bottle' scandal, which inflames the command to the point where normal military functions are impaired. Cardigan is a borderline madman who flogs and expels a sergeant for refusing to spy for him, and takes the simplest error as an affront to his ostentatious masculinity: he despises young Captain Nolan (David Hemmings) simply because he's seen action in India. Cardigan personally equips and 'owns' the Light Brigade, a corps of 700 beautiful young horsemen-officers who yearn for battle just like the little toy soldiers they resemble. This is a terrible mistake, for neither man can think past his own ego and status. He appoints himself expeditionary leader, while feuding, petty rivals Lord Lucan (Harry Andrews) and Lord Cardigan (Trevor Howard) are placed in field command positions. The administrative head of the Army, the borderline-senile Lord Ragland (John Gielgud), keeps confusing the Russian enemy with the French to whom he lost his arm, thirty years before. Most have bought their commissions as well. Unfortunately, except for constant fighting in India, England's home officers haven't seen real action for decades, and there is a backlog of inexperienced noblemen seeking to make their careers before retirement. England has decided to 'rescue' Turkey from the depredations of Russia, and decides to send an expeditionary force to the Crimea. But The Charge of the Light Brigade itself is a beauty - two hours and eleven minutes of unrelieved rage directed at the folly of war.ġ854. For a big studio to set this art house anti-war liberal loose with a huge budget was an economic blunder reminiscent of the total military disaster in the movie. He found a home at United Artists but never repeated his box office successes, giving UA instead melancholy think-pieces like Mademoiselle and awkward vehicles like Ned Kelly. Harry Andrews, Jill Bennett, David HemmingsĮnglish director Tony Richardson hit it big with the rousing Tom Jones but was more at home with subversive social gauntlets like his influential Loneliness of the Long-Distance Runner. Starring Trevor Howard, Vanessa Redgrave, John Gielgud,
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |