Another Country

I haven't seen this movie in years. Perhaps it's time to watch it again. I was just looking at the credits and realized how many big names were in it. At the time, I didn't know any of them. The movie is visually stunning, with beautiful cinematography. And the actors aren't a burden to watch. One of the striking memories for me was that this was perhaps the first movie I ever say with an unapologetic portrayal of homosexuality, but the movie wasn't really (to my mind) *about* homosexuality. It was one facet of a gay character's personality, and it was addressed as a personality component that manifests differently for different people. For some, it is a phase. For others, a burden. For others still, just a fact. This is not an hour and a half you'll want back when it's over.

I found this film thoroughly unenjoyable. There was very little in this motion picture that I valued as "great cinema" - even using the word 'great' in a review of it seems excessively flattering. This film does not deserve to have such a word attributed to it. Set in the monotony of a Christian (so I assume) boarding school in 1931 England, any hope of a plot line is painfully non-existent and all events that occurred in this film agglutinated into one another like some atrocious melting pot. Or a car crash. Even at a running time of a mere 85 minutes, this film dragged on for far too long. Its two leading characters, Guy (Rupert Everett) and Tommy (a very young Colin Firth), are so boringly aspirational. Whether it be favouring Communism or infatuation over a fellow student, the two are so hopelessly dull and lose engagement over their audience relatively instantaneously. Their incessant soliloquies, dreaming of 'breaking free', swiftly become tedious and over-rehearsed. Some may see this film as "brave" for tackling the taboo of homosexuality in schools - especially in the early 1930s - and it may well have been, had it not been written so poorly. This is a sensitive subject yet it has not been treated that way, instead offering its audience indirect and misguided babble that neither satisfies nor interests. There is so precious little in this film that provokes any real thought as everything we are given is provided via insignificant segments of derailed trains of thought. It's like if someone gives you a joke and you don't realise that last sentence was the punchline. This is a film in which you will forever be waiting for a punchline. But, of course, it never comes. The only redeeming features are its beautiful, aristocratic settings amid the gorgeously vintage school building and Peter Biziou's very stylish cinematography. The sweeping camera movements devour the scenery and give us something wonderful to substitute for the plot-holed screenplay. This film is visually so much more impressive than its translucent story. Performances from semi-decent actors (at the time, at least), shoddy screen writing and misguided directing leave audiences unimpressed and dissatisfied with a hatefully deluded story that gets nowhere. This is a film that takes forever to say nothing.

You'd think a movie making a point about treason would allow some room for depth and ideas. But this movie is a shallow, wealth and privilege-envy piece. Pretty boys traipse through this would-be drama that adopts the viewpoint of a petulant, oblivious, vain, homosexual snob away at school in Jolly Old. The twee goings-on advance the preposterous premise that Guy Bennett (based on Guy Burgess) went Commie because he was gay, and was thrown out of school before he got to wear his foppish upper-classmen vest. Oh brother! ...oh, and he received a caning once. He was OK with the canings others received as a routine part of the English school system, but HIS caning hurt. This is roughly analogous to saying Guy Bennett became a roadside bandit, a pirate, or an evil scientist because he had a bad experience at Cambridge. Yeah, everyone has a bad experience at Cambridge. As depicted here, Bennett becoming a Communist in response to his social structure is as likely as Martha Stewart becoming a Sumo wrestler after she burnt a soufflé. Bennett is interested in nothing but himself, as played by Rupert Everett. "How dare you think about the script? Just look at those high production values!"

I think it's a very well made film (although I know nothing about the 1930's of British Boarding Schools). Mr. Everett gives an outstanding performance as Guy Bennett. My favorite scene, when he sneaks out at one night and spends it on a boat with his friend (played by Colin Firth) I thought that was most romantic.(at least to me at that age). Too bad the ending is a bit disappointing. Still I enjoy watching that movie over and over again. It is sensuous, romantic and thought provoking drama.

Why did this one Guy Burgess, of the multitudes (according to the movie) who engaged in gay sex at prep school, end up betraying his country and class to the Stalinist soviets, and why should we care? You'll never learn from this movie. As best I can tell from it, Burgess cared nothing about the rights of the working classes, and had no particular issues with the extreme privileges of the oligarchy in England. Homosexuality certainly wouldn't have stood in his way if he had been more discreet. In fact he seems to have ratted out of a fit of pique over being outmanoeuvred in the competition for the most privileged rank. I saw no reason to admire the Burgess character. The villain Fowler was only guilty of petty stiff-neckedness, as far as I could see, Judd was perhaps admirable, but flat, and in fact the most interesting character was Barclay, the reasonable prefect. This was an interesting introduction to the intricate politics of elite British boys' schools. The boys were certainly good looking, but it was not a sexy movie, the drama fell pretty slack towards the end, and I'm just as ignorant of the interesting career of Guy Burgess as I was before.

A quintessentially English film, with a style close to Brideshead Revisited. Stunning privilege intertwined with acute suffering. Haunting, trepid, futile, beautiful. My favourite quote: Interviewer: Is there anything you miss about England? Guy: I miss the cricket.