Art of Film on Sky Arts - Series 2 Episode 5 - David Lean in Black and White

 

Our host Ian Nathan introduced this episode describing David Lean's "early films grew to define Britishness". "A technical virtuoso, a natural director, a master of iconic images". And his editing "a marvel". We hear about his childhood and the first films he went to see. He was given his first movie camera and soon became a tea boy at Gaumont Pictures. He worked his way up due to his enthusiasm and talent. 

He was soon recognised as a great editor and Neil Norman tells us he became known as the best in Britain. Steven Armstrong added that he rescued films. Kim Newman said that at all times he wanted to produce quality work, no matter what the subject. Lean struck up a relationship with Noel Coward who had come back to Britain from Hollywood during the second world war. He wanted to make the propaganda movie  In Which We Serve that was released in 1942. He wanted to direct his own performance but had no interest in any other scenes. So these he let to David Lean as co-director. It was he who brought in that intricate flashback structure.

The two then formed a production company Cineguild Productions with Coward as writer/producer and Lean as director. Ian Nathan says that "every film they made together is now considered a classic". Neil Norman tells us about 1944's This Happy Breed that was based on the stage play. Then in 1945 came Brief Encounter with Celia Johnson (see separate post) followed by Great Expectations in 1946. This was Lean on his own, steeping himself in Dickens and writing the adaptation himself. Christina Newland thinks he "streamlined Dickens incredibly well". His editing was classic. The casting was superb with Alec Guinness straight out of the navy and the start of a lifelong partnership.

Guinness plays Fagan in Lean's 1948 Oliver Twist, convincing the director with a tremendous audition. We are told that Lean pictured Victorian London so well when the city "comes alive". Then three films with Lean's then wife Ann Todd. The Passionate Friends from 1949, Madeleine in 1950 and The Sound Barrier in 1952.Ann was a big star at that time. Lean's last film in black and white came in 1952 with the black comedy Hobson's Choice based on the stage play. A kind of retelling of King Lear. What came next were the big epics and that is where this episode finishes. But "Lean is already a genius".

P.S. I did happen to meet Ann Todd when I was a boy in London in the mid nineteen fifties. She frequented my father's shop on Kensington High Street and we were invited to her house in Holland Park.