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Remembered Today:

Journey's End movie


Steven Broomfield

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Sorry if this has been raised previously, but a chum sent me this link from The Grauniad about a forthcoming film of Journey's End. The article is slightly hyperbolic and makes rather juvenile comparisons with modern affairs, but the film would be worth looking out for.

 

A search of the Extensive Library found THIS and THIS

 

I'm rather fond of the 1930 version, so it will be interesting to see how this shapes up.

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Effectively there has already been a remake - set in the RFC. Some like it some don't

The play is a pretty perfect piece of work - but every 'remake' (can anyone suggest a really worthwhile one?) has a rewritten script and we've seen to often how almost everything filmed now on the Great War has to have a new 'perspective'. 

Let's face it a shot at dawn officer who has lost his nerve could be a possibility!!

 

More relevant is that there's also a biography of RCF  about to be published

Edited by David Filsell
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The BBC did a good production about twenty (plus) years ago with Jason Connery in it. I think it was rebroadcast once.  I wonder if it is one of those recordings which has been lost.

 

Roger M

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There have been a number of GWF members involved in this project, and I think some of the doubters will be pleasantly suprised. As I go back to cleaning a mountain of muddy WW1 kit, I'll leave you with an image of what's sat on my desk as I type this... ;)

 

https://postimg.org/image/r44hcla1z/

 

Hold_The_Line.jpg

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Thanks, Andrew: I'm not doubting, to be honest. It's a play I very much like and as it's not been made for the cinema for over 80 years, probably not going to upset anyone who remember the original (which is, IIRC, rather stagey and clunky, as befits a film of its age!). I'm rather looking forward to this.

 

I am surprised it seems not to have been discussed here sooner.

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On ‎12‎/‎18‎/‎2016 at 19:55, Steven Broomfield said:

I am surprised it seems not to have been discussed here sooner.

 

Those involved were issued the usual strict secrecy instructions at the start - which were promptly ignored by quite a few of the leading cast, who almost immediately started putting pictures on social media and the like! Those of us rather further down the chain of command have naturally been a little more hesitant in drawing attention except where leaks have already occurred... such as this picture, which was taken by one Sam Claflin and posted by him on his Twitter feed. A particular favourite of mine, it shows dead centre (looking viewers left and in specs) one Private Upton, with some bloke called Paul Bettany immediately to his left...

 

https://postimg.org/image/4b0sih5vmz/

 

Ipswich_Journey_s_End_pic.jpg

Edited by Andrew Upton
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Andrew, that photo and your comments make me feel quite optimistic.

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I haven't come across negativity towards the film in particular. What has infuriated quite a lot of people is the claim by the theatre critic Robert Gore-Langton that women made up a large part of the original audiences because they wanted to find out what the war had been like,  but now “.... Women might not buy history books about the first world war, but they would go and see that play.”

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18 hours ago, rolt968 said:

The BBC did a good production about twenty (plus) years ago with Jason Connery in it. I think it was rebroadcast once.  I wonder if it is one of those recordings which has been lost.

 

Roger M

I didn't know the Beeb had done a version with Connery, J. but I saw him playing Stanhope onstage at the Whitehall in the late '80s. Nicky Henson was Osbo(u?)rne.

 

The play ended with a great coup de théâtre, a sudden, huge crash which made the audience jump, and cutting of all lights as the dugout received (we assume) a direct hit, killing all the occupants.

 

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1 hour ago, Dragon said:

I haven't come across negativity towards the film in particular. What has infuriated quite a lot of people is the claim by the theatre critic Robert Gore-Langton that women made up a large part of the original audiences because they wanted to find out what the war had been like,  but now “.... Women might not buy history books about the first world war, but they would go and see that play.”

Not very patronising, then.

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On 19/12/2016 at 10:12, Chris Foster said:

Here is a link to the 1988 TV version, which Roger M refers to. I remember watching the first time around. And then again a couple of years ago, when I found it on YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y98QdRmLfbQ

 

 

Thanks for posting the link, I wasn't aware of this production.  I shall watch it later at my leisure.

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On ‎19‎/‎12‎/‎2016 at 10:12, Chris Foster said:

Here is a link to the 1988 TV version, which Roger M refers to. I remember watching the first time around. And then again a couple of years ago, when I found it on YouTube

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y98QdRmLfbQ

 

 I was wrong about who played in it. I wonder where I got Connery, J from. I didn't see him in the West End production.

 

I do remember Edward Petherbridge as Osborne in the TV production.

 

Roger M

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  • 9 months later...
On 19/12/2016 at 12:39, Dragon said:

I haven't come across negativity towards the film in particular. What has infuriated quite a lot of people is the claim by the theatre critic Robert Gore-Langton that women made up a large part of the original audiences because they wanted to find out what the war had been like,  but now “.... Women might not buy history books about the first world war, but they would go and see that play.”

 

Just reading this thread for the first time.

Ha, ha, ha. Robert should take a look at some of my collection of WW1 books currently (by coincidence) spread out around me. Not to mention the new ones I just ordered this evening!

 

Margaret (woman and inveterate book buyer :-) )

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Thanks for resurrecting this thread, Margaret, I'd completely forgotten about it.  I took the opportunity to watch the BBC production last night and was quite impressed.  An excellent cast, I was particularly impressed by Edward Petherbridge as Osbourne, a splendid performance. 

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Just for info the 1988 version is being broadcast on the Yesterday channel next Saturday 14/10 at 21:00.

 

John

ps - have just watched All the Kings men again

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10 hours ago, Knotty said:

 

 

John

ps - have just watched All the Kings men again

 

Why?

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My late brother in law was an extra soldier when it was filmed in Spain, missed him the first time and missed him again last night - But its recorded this time:D

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12 hours ago, Knotty said:

Just for info the 1988 version is being broadcast on the Yesterday channel next Saturday 14/10 at 21:00.

 

John

ps - have just watched All the Kings men again

Thanks for letting us know, I will make a note of that.

Unfortunately I missed All the Kings Men last night (mixed views about it but would have watched).

 

RM

 

 

Presumably the story about Noel Coward playing Stanhope opposite John Mills as Raleigh is well known?

RM

Edited by rolt968
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1 hour ago, rolt968 said:

 

 

 

Presumably the story about Noel Coward playing Stanhope opposite John Mills as Raleigh is well known?

RM

 

Not by me!

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On ‎08‎/‎10‎/‎2017 at 13:20, 593jones said:

 

Not by me!

 

I got this from Gyles Brandreth's "Great Theatrical Disasters".

 

John Mills was appearing as Stanhope in a touring production of Journey's End which reached, I think, Singapore, where Noel Coward was appearing in production of his own. Noel Coward prevailed on the producer to let him play Stanhope one evening as he had always wanted to play the part. All went well until the last scene when Stanhope bends over the body of Raleigh lying on the bed in the dugout. Coward's helmet fell off and struck Mills somewhere extremely painful. The corpse reacted most unconvincingly.

 

Incidentally Journey's End gets a mention in The Art of Coarse Acting, in that the very end of the play is a disaster waiting to happen. The final stage direction stays that there should an explosion and then the dugout collapses. Actually I have never  seen this happen in a modern production - usually something like explosion - flash - blackout which is almost certainly better. Green describes a production where the obstinate set defied all the efforts of the stage crew to make it collapse on cue, but it fell in on the cast while taking their curtain calls.

 

It perhaps says a lot for the 2004 West End production that knowing both those stories, neither came into my mind throughout the evening.

RM

 

 

Edited by rolt968
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Hmmm, painful!  However, I'm sure they carried it off like true professionals.

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  • 3 weeks later...

They have released the full length film trailer for the film - with some very fine acting in the back of the trench in the opening scene from an unknown soldier cowering from the blasts... :ph34r::

 

 

 

Edited by Andrew Upton
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  • 3 weeks later...

Another clip released... lots of familiar faces as usual:

 

 

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