The story of a mining family in Newcastle or CastleTyne, which used to be a center of wool processing and later became legendary for its coal -- so much so that nobody wanted to bring coals to Newcastle. All of the working folk are grimy, and they're split between union and non-union. Now management wants them to work Scupper Flats, a coal field underground whose excavation approaches the River Tyne too closely. The union has deemed it safe enough and management argues that they wouldn't flood their own mine. Yet, if the earthy partition between mine and river should give way, the results will be distressful.
The workers call a strike. Work stops and everyone scrounges for food. Breakfast is a cup of tea and a slice of rough bread. Michael Redgrave is the sober son of an ordinary mining family, working through the night to complete his application for a scholarship. His family's feelings about college are mixed and Redgrave himself seems dispirited.
Living on the edge like that used to seem romantic to some people, probably still does. After all, the artist starving in his garret, François Villon stealing gold, Jean Valjean becoming mayor, Horatio Alger, poverty as a speed bump on the road to achievement. But if you've been there, the sense of challenge fades and despair takes its place. For example, here we have the miners sitting around the brick-lined mews, exchanging unpleasant pleasantries, with no work and no money. And then the wife of one of the workers comes down with pneumonia. The only treatment is a cup of beef broth but the butcher, tired of all the begging, refuses to surrender any beef bones. It's a conundrum.
Redgrave gets his scholarship in the TyneCastle and we hear him give a speech about the need for public ownership of natural resources that would land him in the dog house in today's America. He also enters into a tangled relationship with Margaret Lockwood, his co-player in "The Lady Vanishes" from a few years earlier, here an uneducated and tarty young usherette.
She's attractive but, like all of us, isn't entirely open with those she deals with. She's extremely anxious to be married. She needs desperately to get away from her domineering mother, and when her flighty boyfriend leaves she turns to Redgrave, protesting a love for him that she doesn't feel. She persuades Redgrave to drop out of college and take a job as a schoolteacher because she doesn't want to wait until he earns his degree. He does as she asks, which is a big mistake for him, the fool.
Back in the mining town, she sits around eating bonbons and reading magazines but the moment he walks through the door she hides the magazines, pouts, and wordlessly, brusquely, brings him a cup of tea. He asks what's wrong and she launches a litany of complaints -- no maid, no wireless, a town drained of life. And she nags him too, driving the spike home, telling him not to leave the table without excusing himself, and so forth. At this point, I wasn't sure whether I was watching the movie or "Married With Children" or experiencing a flashback to my own catastrophic brush with marriage. She blows off Redgrave's Mom and Dad. She cuckolds Redgrave. She splits. She's really terrible.
This is a movie about coal miners and if you've seen "How Green Was My Valley" or any other movie about coal miners you'll be able to guess the ending. Don't expect too much in the way of sentimentality because there isn't any. This isn't Hollywood and Darryl F. Zanuck isn't rewriting everything.
It was directed by Carol Reed but it's an early effort. Aside from certain camera angles and some striking touches of dramatic lighting there isn't that much to suggest the masterpieces that were to follow. Some others have commented that there are no villains in the story but that's not quite true. The mine owners are among the villains but at least one of them is shown as human. And among the workers, there are plenty of thoughtless people as well as principled ones.
The workers call a strike. Work stops and everyone scrounges for food. Breakfast is a cup of tea and a slice of rough bread. Michael Redgrave is the sober son of an ordinary mining family, working through the night to complete his application for a scholarship. His family's feelings about college are mixed and Redgrave himself seems dispirited.
Living on the edge like that used to seem romantic to some people, probably still does. After all, the artist starving in his garret, François Villon stealing gold, Jean Valjean becoming mayor, Horatio Alger, poverty as a speed bump on the road to achievement. But if you've been there, the sense of challenge fades and despair takes its place. For example, here we have the miners sitting around the brick-lined mews, exchanging unpleasant pleasantries, with no work and no money. And then the wife of one of the workers comes down with pneumonia. The only treatment is a cup of beef broth but the butcher, tired of all the begging, refuses to surrender any beef bones. It's a conundrum.
Redgrave gets his scholarship in the TyneCastle and we hear him give a speech about the need for public ownership of natural resources that would land him in the dog house in today's America. He also enters into a tangled relationship with Margaret Lockwood, his co-player in "The Lady Vanishes" from a few years earlier, here an uneducated and tarty young usherette.
She's attractive but, like all of us, isn't entirely open with those she deals with. She's extremely anxious to be married. She needs desperately to get away from her domineering mother, and when her flighty boyfriend leaves she turns to Redgrave, protesting a love for him that she doesn't feel. She persuades Redgrave to drop out of college and take a job as a schoolteacher because she doesn't want to wait until he earns his degree. He does as she asks, which is a big mistake for him, the fool.
Back in the mining town, she sits around eating bonbons and reading magazines but the moment he walks through the door she hides the magazines, pouts, and wordlessly, brusquely, brings him a cup of tea. He asks what's wrong and she launches a litany of complaints -- no maid, no wireless, a town drained of life. And she nags him too, driving the spike home, telling him not to leave the table without excusing himself, and so forth. At this point, I wasn't sure whether I was watching the movie or "Married With Children" or experiencing a flashback to my own catastrophic brush with marriage. She blows off Redgrave's Mom and Dad. She cuckolds Redgrave. She splits. She's really terrible.
This is a movie about coal miners and if you've seen "How Green Was My Valley" or any other movie about coal miners you'll be able to guess the ending. Don't expect too much in the way of sentimentality because there isn't any. This isn't Hollywood and Darryl F. Zanuck isn't rewriting everything.
It was directed by Carol Reed but it's an early effort. Aside from certain camera angles and some striking touches of dramatic lighting there isn't that much to suggest the masterpieces that were to follow. Some others have commented that there are no villains in the story but that's not quite true. The mine owners are among the villains but at least one of them is shown as human. And among the workers, there are plenty of thoughtless people as well as principled ones.