Rent Went the Day Well? (1942)

Sinister Beauty - Went the Day Well? review by CH

Although this film opens after the war as a villager stands in a churchyard and recalls something of events a few years earlier, in fact the film was made and released in 1942.

Based on a story by Graham Greene which he collected only towards the end of his life (though it had appeared, strangely enough, in a children's anthology), it was directed by Brazilian-born Cavalcanti whom he much admired. Set during the Whitsun weekend of 1942, it tells of a sleepy village (named Bromley End, and filmed in Turville) where its array of inhabitants found themselves at the vanguard of a world turned upside down. Here we have characters ranging from a gentle, strong-minded vicar to a bedraggled poacher who is passing on the tricks of his trade to a very young Harry Fowler. Scenes range from a village store, and telephone exchange to a Manor House lined with pictures along its twisting staircase.

Among the cast are many canny women (among them Elizabeth Allan and Thora Hird), who, as events unfold, come increasingly to the fore, even the fire: there is some startling violence here, all the more effective as it is not drenched in blood but of a piece with a film in which there is continual use of light and shadow, whether by night or day, inside or out. The cinematography is wonderful. As James Agee wrote in his review when the film was duly released in America some while later (mid-1944), he thought the best of it was "in its relating of the people and their action to their homes, their town, their tender, lucid countryside. As the audience watches from a hill, with the eyes at once of a helpless outsider, a masked invader, and a still innocent defender, a mere crossroads imparts qualities of pity and terror which, to be sure, it always has, but which it seldoms shows us except under tilted circimstances. And at moments, when the invaders prowlingly approach through the placid gardens of the barricaded manor in the neat morning light, the film has the sinister, freezing beauty of an Auden prophecy come true".

For some years, even decades, the film fell from sight, even though there is much in it of a piece with eternal Ealing delights. It is now well established as a classic of English film making, one which time and again takes by surprise even those who have already seen it.

Careless talk. - Went the Day Well? review by Steve

Cavalcanti was born and raised in Brazil, but worked in the UK from the thirties, most notably for the GPO documentary film unit. And there is an element of docudrama to Went the Day Well, presented by church warden Mervyn Johns as if narrating to us an actual news story, of the vanguard to a German invasion repelled by the local community in a picture perfect image of English village life. Then rent asunder by Operation Sealion.

It was adapted from a story by Graham Greene as a vehicle for propaganda and for public information to encourage vigilance. It is an exciting and suspenseful film with the typical dry humour and mustn't grumble make-do of the war films made from 39-45. But what is most special, is how intensely it is communicated. This is the work of a country for whom the threat of invasion was a recent reality and was still a possibility. That is palpable.

There are three incidents which best demonstrate that potency: when Muriel George mentions her regret at her inability to have children, her last thought before brutally killing a Nazi soldier, knowing she will then die; when Patricia Hayes breaks down utterly with fear but then finds the strength to carry on the resistance; and when Marie Lohr pockets a grenade to save a room of children.

These actors were a footnote in the annals of UK character actors. But here they are haunting.

Classic British War Drama - Went the Day Well? review by GI

This is a quite unusual film in the Ealing Studio canon, renowned more for their comedies this is a wartime drama made at darkest time of the war and, whilst probably intended as a morale boosting film it is rather an unsentimental story. It's also the only film made during the war years that deals with the, then, serious fear of German invasion. It's also a prescient masterpiece and one of the finest British films of the 1940s. In the small picturesque village of Bramley End a company of soldiers arrives seeking billets from the accommodating villagers. But they are German parachutists in disguise preparing the area for the German invasion that is soon to begin. The plucky villagers soon smell a rat and prove to be a force to be reckoned with. This results in a gritty battle and shows the worth of the Home Guard who eventually arrive to save the day. It's a tense story especially as there's a traitor in the midst of the village and the Germans prove to be quite ruthless. In many ways there's the expected stereotyping of the characters, the Germans are all cruel and the villagers include the vicar who refuses to obey the invaders, the local constable, the courageous sailor on leave etc etc but it's the exciting story that marks the film as an exciting drama. Jack Higgins later used it as the basis for his novel, The Eagle Has Landed. A film about betrayal, disillusionment and courage. In many ways it's an odd war film but its clever and exudes a sort of factual look and feel marking it as a landmark British film.