Dunkirk (1958)

Directed by Leslie Norman; produced by Michael Balcon

The last days of May, 1940, saw the climax of the German invasion of France and the besieging of the British Expeditionary Force’s fighting formations at the port of Dunkirk, against the English Channel. Against all odds, the British managed to evacuate the majority of their men, to form the basis of the armies that would liberate western Europe four years later.

In December, 2017, I reviewed an identically titled movie about the same event. I wrote then that I was disappointed in it; watching this earlier version emphasized what the later was missing.

One of the big differences between the 1958 version and the 2017 is the script. The sheer amount of story that the ‘58 movie incorporates is impressive. This movie begins just before the German invasion of the Low Countries and France, and includes some indication of how disjointed the Allied retreat became under the intense pressure of the German assault. We see the break-up of some British units into small parties, trying to make their way to their comrades; we see French refugees, attacked and killed by German air attacks; we see the often hopeless but necessary sacrifice of rear-guard units.

Both films use fictionalised accounts mixed with real events, but the ’58 film includes a wider vision of the crisis. We are shown high-ranking personages, such as Lord Gort (Cyril Raymond), Commander-in-Chief of the BEF, making his momentous decision to disobey orders and use his reserves to keep a corridor open to the Channel, and Vice-Admiral Ramsay (Nicholas Hannen), commanding at Dover, masterminding the evacuation. These scenes are juxtaposed with those of fictional Corporal Binns (John Mills) trying to guide his section through the dangerous countryside after their officer is killed. This duality gives a good sense of both ends of the operation, neither really aware of, but each affecting, the other.

As well, the script manages to introduce a great deal of information by way of almost incidental scenes. The collapse of French morale upon the German breakthrough is conveyed in the reaction of a French reporter; the lack of British air support explained in a complaint by a distraught RAF aircraftsman. British movies of the era seemed adept at including background information in a casual manner. In terms of drama, the script is pretty straightforward, but manages to introduce real tension, as when Binns’s squad must slip through a German position at night, when they find that the enemy has inadvertently surrounded them, or when Ramsay is begging his superiors for more ships.

Something that also occurred to me about the writing is that the movie seems to have been produced when British films were still principally for British (that is, non-American) audiences. Words and phrases - and names - that would be familiar to Britons of that era would not immediately translate. For instance “u.s.” automobiles did not refer to their origin, but to them being “unserviceable”.

The acting is natural and credible. Especially good are Mills and Richard Attenborough, who plays a civilian. His character, a garage-owner, is not particularly brave, rather glad of his ‘reserved occupation’ and doesn’t want to put himself in danger. Even so, he is dissatisfied with his non-part in the war, and finds himself caught up in the fleet of ‘little ships’ that helps rescue the trapped soldiers. He is as representative of the ordinary civilian as Mills, a reluctant corporal (“I never wanted these stripes,” he says, to which a comrade replies, “Well, you got ‘em.”) is of the ordinary soldier.

When watching two movies about the same subject, one made sixty years after the other reinforced something else. It is that people acted in real life differently then, and it is difficult for modern actors, writers and directors to capture the manners then prevalent. It may be the greater cause of the different ‘feel’ of movies then than is simply the style of acting or directing.

On the subject of the latter, the direction is good, though the least impressive of the major aspects of the film. The amount of stock or archival footage is wisely restricted to shots of aeroplanes and a few images of the beach. Considering the contrast in technology (a cast of thousands in the ‘50s meant thousands of people, not computer images) and budget (even for its time, this Dunkirk’s funds were rather limited) between 1958 and 2017, this version of the most victorious defeat of World War Two is the better. On its own merits, too, Dunkirk is an excellent movie, a fine evening’s viewing for history fan and drama devotee alike.