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review: went the day well?
25/07/01 @ 1:52 p.m.
This entry has a load of spoilers, so if you've not seen the movie don't read it. Or do read it but don't moan! Went The Day Well is a British propaganda piece from the Second World War that manages to find depth beyond it message. The plot is inventive and, for the most part, chillingly convincing. Beginning at an unknown time in its future, the film starts with a quaint talking-to-camera moment as the audience is welcomed to the village of Bramley End. From there, we are taken back to a wartime Whit Sunday, as a troop of soldiers come to the village to set up their defences. We soon realise that the soldiers are not English, but German, and with the co-operation of a respected member of the community are preparing to take the village as the first step of a country-wide invasion. With fifty years of hindsight and no first-hand experience of life on the home front, the danger can hardly be imagined, and the fear it must have inspired in the contemporary audience cannot be reproduced. But while its power is no doubt diminished, it still works as a tense and involving thriller. There are a few weak points that undermine its credibility; the Germans’ English is probably too perfect and they seem too familiar with colloquialisms, and having a radio operator who can barely understand English wasn’t the brightest idea, but these are minor complaints against a film that is plausible throughout. Given its release date, it is rather daring in its depiction of the Nazi soldiers, showing them as evil but not sadistic. It could easily have gone down the route of having them rape and murder the villagers for their own amusement, but it shows restraint in having them kill only those who are seen as immediate threats to their plan. Indeed, there is a cutting reference to the exaggerated propaganda that shows Nazis happily sticking babies on pitchforks. There is balance, too, in its depiction of the French. While two characters discuss their early surrender we are given both points of view; first condemnation for their perceived cowardice, then sympathy at the realisation that they are now living under Nazi rule, a fate deserved by no one. To find such balance in a mid-war movie is refreshing. The characters are warm and convincing, if a little clichéd, and there is a genuine sense of community within the village that helps us to feel sorrow for the few that are murdered. Here, again, the film shows a degree of courage in killing off the best characters without hesitation. A particularly touching moment comes when one of the villagers realises the man she loves is the traitor, and knows she has to stop him herself. Without the depth of characterisation, this would have meant nothing. Cynicism would tell us to laugh at how it champions the courage of normal people, but such thoughts should be ignored and replaced with respect for those who lived through a horror we can barely imagine. To its generation, Went the Day Well was a warning to be ever vigilant; to ours it is a tense thriller that reminds us how lucky we are. It can hardly be called a classic, but it seems a shame that, at the time of writing, there are no other comments or reviews on the database. It is inventive, thoughtful, tense, funny, and charming, and deserves to be held in higher regard.
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