Lean Quest! This Happy Breed

The David Lean quest continues today with Lean's second film (and his first color work), This Happy Breed. This was actually Lean's first solo effort, as he had co-directed In Which We Serve with Noel Coward. Coward allowed Lean, his protege, to adapt one of his plays to film. The result is a fairly entertaining, albeit inevitably dated movie, which is affective in showcasing the British at their best.

The film covers the lives of a middle-class British family, the Gibbons, in the interwar period, where Britain struggled to recover from the horrific carnage of the Great War, manage unrest both political and social, and return to a life of complacent normalcy - seemingly in disregard for the world around them. Frank (Robert Newton) is an old-school, conservative gent who served with distinction in the war; Ethel (Celia Johnson) is his quiet, hard-working, straight-laced wife; Reg (John Blythe) is his headstrong but loving son; Vi (Eileen Erskine), his quiet older daughter; and Queenie (Kay Walsh), the lovely but self-absorbed and impulsive younger daughter who struggles to manage a relationship with sailor Billy (John Mills), but finds his long absences intolerable. Most of the film's plot and problems come from the children, the young generation trying to find their way in uncertain times and strike out on their own, while their parents try to hold the family together and cling to their old ways.

The movie was made, it would seem, as a wartime morale film - not really a "flag-waver", but something to keep the average Limey's spirits up as they sifted through the rubble of their apartment. It embraces conservativism of the most benign sort - complacency and nostalgia. The key line of the movie, perhaps, is when Frank chastizes Queenie's complaining about their middle class status: "We are what we are, and if you don't like it, you can lump it." All over Britain, Tories and fuddy-duddies no doubt applauded this line, or at least nodded their heads sagely. Good show, sir. How dare anyone want to rise above their station in life! The nerve!

The sword cuts both ways though, as illustrated when Reg joins up with a group of socialist agitators engaging in a strike. The movie is not overtly hostile to the socialists, rather depicting them as rather foolish character, whose problem is that they "want everything done quickly" - not a very British proposition. Sam Ledbetter (Guy Verney), Reg's agitator friend, can be seen by auteurists as perhaps a very loose precursor to Tom Courtenay's Strelnikov in Doctor Zhivago - except that he's depicted as a goofball rather than a force of righteous indignation. (The Fascist orator we see much later is equally clownish, but he is just a background character.) Not only are people unsatisfied with their state in life in the wrong; those dissatisfied with the general state of the world need to be taught a lesson. Those pesky kids...

However, in fairness, it should be pointed out that the movie doesn't really favor political conservatism, but rather social and personal complacency. The movie repeatedly states that one should accept their lot in life - not necessarily a bad proposition in and of itself, although the film's seeming refusal to acknowledge that change or self-improvement/advancement is rather awkward. The key to happiness is complacency, marriage to the right person, and finding one's station within society (and a healthy dab of patriotism to boot) - and you'll have a kindly old father or fiancee to set you straight, should you stray. And yet, the movie isn't angry, senile old codgers complaining about the old days and the state of today's youth. The youngsters, Reg and Queen, are portrayed as simply easily misled, confused youngsters who ultimately renige on their mistakes. This is understandable, given the time and the climate in which the film was made, but it inevitably dates the movie for the modern viewers, and perhaps inspire a chuckle or two. Fortunately, though, it's relatively mild and soft-hearted, and so the message doesn't come across in an obnoxious or bull-headed manner.

However, in its second half, Breed does become a bit more thoughtful, as tragedy strikes the Gibbons family - first Queenie runs off with a much older man, then Reg dies in a car. This would be melodrama were it not so well-done, and it's too Lean's immense credit that these tragedies don't come across as mawkish, but rather poignant and even moving.The movie's best scene is undoubtedly when Ethel, having just finished preparing a meal, leaves the kitchen for a moment, only to learn of Reg's death. The camera lingers on the kitchen, the impeccable garden, with children playing outside and happy jazz music playing on the soundtrack - until Ethel re-enters. The shot of Ethel walking into frame, a grim, uncomprehending, is a moment of astonishing power, and I dare say, one of the best moments of Lean's career.

The movie is shot in glorious Technicolor, which honestly surprsied me. This would be Lean's first color film, but given that the film is shot primarily on location in South London (and studio sets), it hardly seems necessary. Ronald Neame's photography is relatively straightforward and undistinguished, and one almost misses the gorgeous, moody black-and-white which Lean and his cinematographers (Neame, Guy Green, Jack Hildyard) worked with in his other early works. Lean's direction has its share of highlights; the parallel shots of the empty house which bookend the film (first foreboding, then familiar), the bravura military parade which is a fore-runner of a similar scene in Doctor Zhivago, and the aforementioned kitchen scene.

The cast is made up of old British pros and up-and-coming talents, many of whom had already worked with Lean, and would be become an invaluable member of his acting repertoire. Robert Newton gives a rather subdued lead performance as model father Frank, quite a departure from the flashy character parts he's best remembered for (Sykes in Lean's Oliver Twist, and Long John Silver in Treasure Island). Celia Johnson (she of Brief Encounter) gives a marvellous performance, and is probably the standout here. Johnson is a remarkable screen presence, beautiful, dignified, lovely and wholly human. It's a pity her film career was rather limited, because in all of her movies she tended to walk away with the show single-handedly. A lovely young Kay Walsh (Mrs. Lean Number Two), a longtime Groggy favorite, is radiant and immensely sympathetic as the wayward Queenie. Lean regulars Stanley Holloway and John Mills pop in for pleasant if unremarkable supporting turns.

All things considered, This Happy Breed is a pretty good film, with some powerful sequences and fine performances. It's also very interesting for its depiction of an uneasy Britain, it's power shaken by four years of brutal carnage, and a new, even more horrifying war breaking out just as soon as they've picked up the pieces. It's pretty low on my list of Lean's, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. 7/10 for the balance of the film; 100/10 for the aforementioned kitchen scene.