Review of Listen to Britain (1942) by Davey M — 20 Oct 2011

I love Humphrey Jennings, and I love "Listen to Britain." As propaganda, it's interesting that the war is most conspicuous in the film through its absence--we see planes flying overhead (a deafening intrusion on the gently blowing trees and wheat fields) and soldiers in bunkers, but the film primarily seems to be a celebration of why we fight, and of how life continues on at home, courageously undaunted in the face of death. Planes pass overhead, but they merit only a glance from the gleaners in the field--war and destruction is only a blip in the natural cycle of life.

Jennings and co-director/co-editor Stewart McAllister return again and again to this juxtaposition of life interrupted and life continuing on in its course, with the gentle reassurance of nature as waves on the shore roll slowly in and out--the destruction of war is pitted against the continual creation and renewal of nature (and, by extension, civilization, music, and dancing, the creative impulse, the spirit of Britain and the human spirit itself: the causes worth fighting for). Though deeply nationalistic, the film transcends its nationalism by embracing the shared heritage of the entire western world--as Dean noted in class, it's a quiet performance of Mozart (as opposed to, say, Ralph Vaughan Williams or Edward Elgar) that boosts morale. Indeed, the entire film is quiet--partly a result of the fuzzy print and muffled soundtrack, but also in its scale: it's a war documentary made up not of battles or sieges, but of little moments, boys and girls flirting and teasing in the dance hall, soldiers listening to a song, couples dancing, two people sitting on a park bench looking out at the ocean, all united by the undercurrent of diagetic music coming from various sources (dance halls, concerts, radios), which motivates the film's spatial movement even as it aurally brings the nation together in a spirit of creation and shared humanity. War is a blip, and life and creation can, must, and will triumph.