MovieChat Forums > The Life and Death of Colonel Blimp (1944) Discussion > War Crimes Denial Movie?

War Crimes Denial Movie?

posted 18 years ago by j-b-imdb
39 replies | jump to latest

First of all, a big hello to imdb and to film fans, especially Powell & Pressburger fans. I've recently bought a 9 DVD box set having seen 'A matter of life and death' which is a great film, and tonight watched this one.

Depicting politics in film can be a very touchy and controversial area, so I feel a little wary about opening this topic up, and yes the film has to be into historical context. Namely its 1943, Britain is in the middle of the second world war, this is a propaganda flick. However there are some major pieces of historical revisionism going on in this picture which need to be counter-balanced to give a fair account. Revisionism which could well be classed as a denial of British war crimes.

So, what's my beef here:

The major focus of the film is the protagonist's struggle to come to terms with the concept of fighting dirty. As stated in the imdb intro 'Clive Candy V.C. has fought in the Boer War and the first world war. He still believes he can win any fight with honour and maintaining "gentlemanly conduct".'

He serves in the Boer war and the first world war and at the end of film is part of the preparations for the second world war. A constant theme of the film is the Colonel's insistence that the British fight fair, a belief that even sends him to Germany to defend the Britain's reputation following the Boer war.

Sorry Colonel, but things just don't add up:

The film sends us back to 1903, a year after the end of the 2nd Boer war. Blimp says 'nothing dirty going on in Africa' - so you didn't know about Britain's concentration camps?

See here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Boer_War#The_concentration_camps

Later we join Blimp in the first world war, he doesn't know about the torture going on (fair enough). But he does rant on about the Germans using chemical weapons and says that the Brits didn't, a statement made in 1918.

Wrong again:

See this information from J Paxman and T Harris, 2002, A higher form of killing – the secret history of chemical and biological warfare, London, Arrow Books

June 1916
Allies use phosgene at the Somme

9 April 1917
Livens projector first used by the British at the Battle of Arras. The projector allowed a 30lb drum of gas to be exploded in lethal concentrations over the enemy, allowing for greater precision.

Ok so it can be argued 'Hey Blimpy didn't know anything about all this bad stuff, even if he was a general.' But my feeling is, the government aren't going to want any dirty washing about past war crimes to be aired in the middle of the most important war since the Napoleonic conflict, and maybe this is the source of Blimp's ignorance.

Aside from trying to correct this historical imbalance, I must say that I enjoyed the film and that it had some real classy touches in it. It can be read that actually Powell and Pressburger have produced a film which on the surface portrays Blimp as lovable but in actuality is cruelly mocking. What fighting does he actually do? The Boer war was a cake walk for the British and in the first world war he doesn't fight, he just drives around looking for some food and a train. He's the classic 'tin soldier man' - a general who never really did anything. Oh I forgot, he hid inside a fort for 7 months and got a VC before we join him in 1903.

Anyhow I hope this pushes a little more information out into the world, and helps to correct another example of censorship in the cinema.

Regards

Another great link for dirty tricks by the Brits:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/secondworldwar/story/0,14058,1640957,00.html

'Marquess of Queensbury rules old chap'

- Oh I am English, and having studied History at GCSE (for 14-16 year olds) level can assure you, that this didn't come up in the curriculum back in 1993. In fact no British war crimes did.

Postscript
Oh here's another quote for American readers from 'A higher form of killing', I'm sure you may well know about it but its so wild, I thought I'd repeat it:

1950
Between 20 and 26 September a spray contaminated with two supposedly harmless bacteria was released in the port of San Francisco by two US Navy minesweepers to test the effectiveness of a chemical attack in the harbour. From the six mock attacks an estimated 117 square miles of the area was contaminated, in other words, every one of the 800,000 inhabitants. These tests were conducted in total secrecy.

Go check the book out if you want to verify this, its really good. Err I'm not a salesperson by the way, and I'm not getting any commission on sales.

[–] 18 years ago

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[–] markfuller 18 years ago

Actually, the film doesn't gloss over it...the scene in the office at Military Intelligence prior to Clive going to Berlin; Clive repeats the camps allegations to Col. Betteridge, blustering about this propaganda being promulgated by Kaunitz........and Betteridge, of Military Intelligence, changes subject. For a film being made in '43, it amounts to a tacit admission. Remember these were not extermination camps or labour camps as in the Third Reich; they were bringing civilians in from farmsteads so as to keep an eye on them; unfortunately the camps were prone to disease and many died....the same was true of the soldiery mind you.
The South African doesn't want to torture the German prisoners, though I can see why you would think that from the film as it exists. In the published script is an unfilmed - or deleted - scene just after Clive leaves; the South African fakes the shooting of one prisoner within earshot of the rest; intimidation perhaps, screwing with their mind certainly, but not torture per se.

[–] 18 years ago

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[–] markfuller 17 years ago

GrantHawks, have you actually seen this film, or did part of its message fly completely over your head ?? Powell and Pressburger would never make anti-muslim films today, for the same reason they didn't make anti-German films during or after the war...they were mature thinkers able to distinguish between ordinary people of a race or creed and fanatics that lurk within any population. Pressburger did escape the Nazis, some of his family did not...but he always differentiated, personally and in his filmwriting, between the german people and Nazis. Did not the voice of reason in 'Blimp', Oberleutnant Theo Kretschmarr-Schuldorff, strike you as possibly being German?? And a German Officer at that?? Similarly, if they were alive to make a film on the subject, they would make great pains to distinguish between Al Qaida and the rest of the Muslim world who despise them as much as you do.....and as for Lefties rolling over against Fascists, you should look up The Spanish Civil War, where The International Brigade, a multi-national left-wing volunteer army ignored their respective governments to fight Franco and his allies, Messrs Hitler and Mussolini, to try and keep Spain free. If they had had some governmental support, and had defeated Franco, World War 2 might not have happened...this was in 1936.

[–] Blueghost 11 years ago

The last part of your paragraph is interesting. How is it that this action influenced Hitler's decision to annex Poland and later invade France?

[–] lewisbetts 17 years ago

Of course it goes on about "conduct", this was essentially a WWII propaganda film. It is hardly going to harp on about mustard gas and scorched earth policies is it?

Phillip, the old bunch is gone. Look at these new heroes. All wind and smoke. Just big mouths.

[–] farne 17 years ago

You've really missed the point on this. Part of the reason the film was seen as problematic at the time was because it does raise questions about the Boer War and First World War. Blimp is blind to what's been going on because he lives in his own small world. For a film made at the height of WWII its pretty staggering that it even raises these questions at all.

[–] jodybeeching 17 years ago

Candy`s naivete is the key to this issue isn`t it? He doesn`t see the bad side of things, and brushes away the South African`s suggestion that the British fought dirty in the Boer war (Which, by the way was no cake- walk, it was a sharp lesson for the British.)

[–] Miles-10 12 years ago

You and Farne are exactly right. And, yes, the effective use of guerilla tactics by the Boers really gave the British "a sharp lesson." My countrymen in the American War of Independence were probably less reliant on guerilla tactics than the Boers were!

Ironically, in view of the character Candy's belief that the Allies did not use phosphene gas, Hitler himself was the victim of a British gas attack in 1918.

I had wondered about what happened to those German soldiers after Candy left them to the tender mercy of the South African officer. By cutting out the following scene where the the Germans were psychologically tortured, the editor-censors created in my mind the possibility that the Germans were physically tortured.

[–] marktayloruk (2388) 6 months ago

You don't get a VC without finding Clive was an officer and a gentleman, a better man than most - including me!

[–] Moonraker99 17 years ago

Troll, or you don't know history.

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] Pharaoh-in-de-Nile 17 years ago

Can I point out that 'concentration camps' in the Boer War sense are different from the 'concentration camps' used by the Nazis...etc...especially since the camps where actually for British citizens of the war made refugee (by as you say among other things the 'Scorched Earth Policy'.

They are not so much a 'war crime' as a lesson in bad management...one that none the less cost many lives.

Hopefully this thread will not become another 'BOERS WER RYT THEY GOODIES' when in fact it should be noted that most thought black men where made to serve them amongst other things...and lets not forget apartheid later on.

As for war crimes, yes Britain (and also/especially the USA) did commit many war crimes in WWI (gas...much like all the other powers) and in WWII (Dresden anyone?).
There were no goodies in my opinion just some that where worse (the Nazis).
Even then nuking a country (Japan) causing deformities for generations in my opinion is as bad as what the Nazi's did (and that was the 'goodies' the allies).

But that is besides the point as this film addresses the fact that war is not a black and white/good vs. evil affair...hence the Germans are not all monsters.

But do you really think that the public during a major war would watch a film where they where depicted as the villains (now maybe...but then again we are not fighting for survival but for conquest)?

"Nothings gonna change my world!"

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] Pharaoh-in-de-Nile 17 years ago

I was rushing actually...they didn't commit any major war crimes in WWI, in fact they weren't there until the very end of the war so that doesn't surprise me.
Most nations in war do commit war crimes...they just do not usually get punished for it if they win.

I disagree that the only war crime belonging to the USA was the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings...actually that was TWO war crimes in it's self.

Here is a list of other war crimes the USA has been accused of:

Biscari massacre - the murder of Axis PoWs.

Canicattì massacre - American Officer kills Italian Civilians.

Chenogne massacre - More killing of German PoWs.

Dachau massacre - The killing of the imprisoned camp guards.

Internment of US citizens - Many US citizens were imprisoned just because they happened to have a shared ancestry with the enemy.

Mistreatment of Japanese prisoners - Many Japanese were tortured, allowed to be executed by Chinese civilians or executed after battles.

Rheinwiesenlager - Many PoWa were starved in transit camps after WWII.

Salina Murders - Nine PoWs were killed and many others injured when a commanding officer fired a machine gun at PoWs...this too place AFTER the German surrender.

Using PoWs to clear minefields - Many were killed due to them being used to clear mines.

So if you think that the USA is always a bright shining Knight that saves the world then you are sadly mistaken...

"Nothings gonna change my world!"

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] LouisRenault 17 years ago

I'm astonished to see 2 posters suggest this film was British propaganda. Why then did the authorities, including Churchill personally, make strenuous efforts to ban it?

During a war you have to maintain the fiction that the other side are all evil and your lot are all good. Otherwise it would be pretty tough to persuade large numbers of men to go off for the express purpose of killing perfect strangers.

This film thoroughly undermined that notion by showing two countries both growing steadily more barbarous. The English soldiers of 1940 were clearly less civilized than the Germans of the 1890s.

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] laddiebuck 15 years ago

It's not just propaganda, that's the whole thing. British authorities and British soldiers were definitely much more civilised than German soldiers and authorities, and even more so than other Allied soldiers.

There are numerous Allied war crimes from WWII, such as several massacres of German or Italian prisoners by Americans, rape of Japanese by Australians, etc. The British do not get off entirely scot-free, as the London Cage interrogation centre already linked to shows, but they did not commit mass murders or mass rapes, and murders or rapes were properly punished.

Here is a good summary article from Wikipedia that does a very good job of summarising a long topic:
http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Allied_war_crimes_during_World_War_II&oldid=294177288

One of the most salient points is the summary table of death rates among POWs. To quote:
"Death rates of POWs held is one measure of adherence to the standards of the treaties because substandard treatment leads to death of prisoners."
Here is the table in linear form, as I can't paste tables into IMDB:
Death rates of POWs held by Axis powers

* Chinese POWs held by Japan: > 99% (only 56 survivors at the end of the war)[76]
* US and British Commonwealth POWs held by Germany: ~4% [75]
* Soviet POWs held by Germany: 57.5% [77]
* Western Allied POWs held by Japan: 27% [78]

[edit] Death rates of POWs held by the Allies

* German POWs in East European (not including the Soviet Union) hands 32.9%[77]
* German soldiers held by Soviet Union: 15-33% (14.7% in The Dictators by Richard Overy, 35.8% in Ferguson[77])
* Japanese POWs held by Soviet Union: 10%
* German POWs in British hands 0.03%[77]
* German POWs in American hands 0.15%[77]
* German POWs in French hands 2.58%[77]
* Japanese POWs held by U.S.: relatively low, mainly suicides according to James D. Morrow[79] or according to Ulrich Straus high as many prisoners were shot by front line troops.[48]

You'll notice that the loest death rates by far are for German POWs held by the British. The British had certainly learnt their lesson from the Boer War, largely due to campaigners like Emily Hobhouse.

While it's not true that "the other side are all evil and your lot are all good", life isn't all gray. The average German soldier really was more brutal and the average British soldier really more humane than was the norm for soldiers at the time.

[–] Pharaoh-in-de-Nile 17 years ago

"Is this German POWs? And whose mines were they clearing? I'd guess German Land mines. Given that someone had clear them, why shouldn't the Germans have been made to clear their own land mines?"

For the same reason their is a convention against it!

Clearing minefields is so dangerous it is almost a death sentence...and you are not supposed to execute PoWs...unless they committed a specific crime (not that I agree with the death penalty).
These were ordinary people, soldiers like the allies.
I have a suspicion that if the Nazis or Japanese did this you amongst many would be revolted.

"And do you have any historical cites for Japanese POWs being tortured by US forces?"

Yes.

Various as reported by Ulrich Straus: http://books.google.com/books?id=x1dQwuiEU3UC&pg=PA206&lpg=PA206&dq=%22japanese+pows%22+american+hands&source=web&ots=Jy7xIG7C1S&sig=J2I027gBjV9cqjD7t3h1-FiQW3o#PPA8,M1

No offence, but people like you are giving Americans a bad name on these boards, always attacking other people's countries for their crimes (and rightfully in most cases) but trying to hide away from your own country's atrocities.
No countries are blameless and all have committed less than noble acts of barbarity.

"Nothings gonna change my world!"

[–] 17 years ago

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[–] Custerfile 16 years ago

It is true that the Allied nations used gas warfare in the Great War, but it seemed advisable once the Germans had seized on the (temporary) advantage of using it first. Of course, if both sides could have agreed to stop using it the overall course of the war would probably not have been much altered.

As for the bombing of Hiroshima being a Nazi-style atrocity -- that term could be better applied to such events as the rape of Nanking, committed by none other than the Japanese.

The atomic bombings were not acts of gratuitous cruelty and in fact were actually a less hideous alternative to an invasion of Japan, which might have cost millions of Allied and Japanese lives and poisoned American-Japanese relations for generations, far worse than the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings and even the "conventional" firebombings used to consume whole cities.

I don't know the filmmakers' views of the actual atomic bombings. But the film in fact could be said to argue that being a "good guy" may require doing things that aren't very nice -- because to avoid doing them would give a gang of criminals an advantage they would not hesitate to seize. (And if they won, there would, as Theo points out to Clive, be no "return match" next year.) Even George Orwell was moved during the Second World War to advise that if someone drops a bomb on your mother, drop two bombs on his mother -- because the only alternative seemed to be slavery under men who were not at all reluctant to do such things.

[–] Steve Crook 16 years ago

I don't know the filmmakers' views of the actual atomic bombings.

They didn't have much of a view of them in 1943. Not many people did
But by 1946, in the prologue for A Matter of Life and Death, they did make a comment about someone messing around with the Uranium atom.

Steve

[–] ContinentalOp 15 years ago

"As for the bombing of Hiroshima being a Nazi-style atrocity -- that term could be better applied to such events as the rape of Nanking, committed by none other than the Japanese."

Here we go again! You Americans and Americanophiles are highly laughable trying to devert blame from your own country. The bombings of Hiroshima and Nagazaki were vile war crimes. Not only was it horrid at the time, but the effects of the bomb are still felt today and will be for many years, unlike Nanking which didn't leave atomic waste in the area.

Yes the rape of Nanking was a hideous crime against humanity but it doesn't justify the lack of regards for innocent Japanese civilians on the USA's part. I find it ironic that the US likes to be remembered as one of the ''good guys'' when atomic (and nuclear) weapons are largely a US invention and WMDs have only really been used by the US...who still owns them! I think the U.N. should force teh US to give up its weapons as it may use them again.

"Jai Guru Deva, Om"

[–] LouisRenault 15 years ago

What a bizarre post. The large-scale rape, torture and murder at Nanking was carried out for fun. The motivation in dropping the bomb was entirely different - to bring the war to an end as quickly as possible and with as few allied casualties as possible. I have never had any doubt it was entirely the proper thing to do.

[–] marktayloruk (2388) a year ago

The Japs had it coming. Whatever our misdeeds they were nothing compared to those of the Germans, Japs and Russians.

[–] RashomonLaStrada 15 years ago

A very interesting thread.

For those interested in the American version a terrific book called "LIES MY TEACHER TOLD ME" looks at U.S. history books used in American classrooms. It pays special attention to what these textbooks include about Pres. Woodrow Wilson, and what they leave out about the man.

http://sundown.afro.illinois.edu/liesmyteachertoldme.php

"The good end happily, the bad unhappily, that is why it is called Fiction."