Rent In Which We Serve (1942)

Raft & Resolve: Coward & Lean’s Salute - In Which We Serve review by griggs

War stories seldom wear their purpose so openly or their craft so well. The film centres on survivors clinging to a life raft; their stories unfold in sober flashbacks that braid duty, loss and home-front resilience. The joints show, but the structure holds.

With Noël Coward writing, starring and co-directing with David Lean, In Which We Serve rises above routine exhortation. The filmmaking is controlled rather than bombastic; set pieces bite without bluster; sentiment stays measured. John Mills lends open-hearted grit, Celia Johnson distils patience into quiet grace, and Coward’s captain carries authority with a light, precise touch. The ensemble is uniformly strong.

It remains undeniably propaganda, tailored to 1942. The camaraderie feels a shade cosier than likely, and the distance between ranks is politely compressed. Even so, the compassion and formal clarity endure. Not a revelation, but a dignified salute to service and survival—made with steadiness, taste and a level head.

The then 'King &. Country' - In Which We Serve review by DJ

  In contrast to the assessment of others, I found this film fell short on interest.  The opening was filled with action, leaving the remainder of the film rather flat, as it was malled by repetition.  A series of flashbacks covers the individual lives of the crew.  it got to the third crew member, which proved just too much for me to handle and I switched it off.

  Noel Coward had a brilliant mind, wrote incredible music scores and was deemed a playwright with exceptional ability, but, to many, failed as an actor, as he was unable to mask his self-assuredness, pomp and rapid speech ... he could touch 200 wpm with ease.

  The genre of this film comes under the heading of 'war time propaganda', necessary in its day, as it helped people survive the threat of tomorrow.  Back then, it was honourable to dupe the people into having hope and convince them that their men would return from the trenches.  To this end, it is thick with so much improbability, as to be unacceptable.  However, the camerawork was excellent, but I found Noel Coward somewhat overbearing ... yet he comes from that era and that's how it was back then.

  The paradigm of any film is to grab the audience's attention in the first 40-seconds and then hold them.  This films grabs the audience's attention in the first 40-seconds and then promptly loses them ten minutes later.  It stands as an historical piece of wartime propaganda, but beyond this, falls well short of today's films, which have undergone 80-yrs of development since this film was made. 

Classic British War Film - A Must See - In Which We Serve review by GI

This is one of the most celebrated of Britain's wartime propaganda films written and part directed by Noël Coward (he sort of gave up during the film finding directing too hard and handed the reins to his co-director, David Lean). It's a story of the HMS Torrin and it's crew, who include John Mills, Bernard Miles and a young Richard Attenborough, whose stories are told in a series of flashbacks. What's fascinating about this film is that it's a war film, with some really good naval combat scenes but also a story of family, love and it provides a nostalgic vision of Britain in the war years including the striking class differences. It's a real classic of British cinema and one of the great war films and deserves a modern audience.