My British Buddy

Britannia rules the waves…

After V-E Day, Brits were, for the most part, feeling pretty good. There was still a lot of recovery to be  done, to be sure, but the fighting in Europe was over and they didn’t have to worry about running out to an Anderson shelter or sending loved ones off to war, although Spam was still very much on the menu.

However, there was plenty of reflection on what had gone on for the past six years, and one of the ways that was done was through the 1945 movie, The Way To the Stars, also known as Johnny In the Clouds. Released in Britain a month after V-E Day, it follows the lives of several Royal Air Force and Army Air Force personnel as they develop friendships with each other amid extremely dangerous circumstances.

The movie opens with sweeping shots of the abandoned Halfpenny Field, where the narrator walks us through the airstrip and the various buildings once humming with activity. The way everything is peeling and floating off the walls, it seems as if the place has been abandoned for years instead of a month or two. The mysterious narrator points out everything, including a tattered pinup girl and a chalkboard full of flight assignments that will never change again. It’s all very ghostly and slightly melancholy.

We’re not allowed to be ghosts for long, though. The movie takes us back to 1940, when the Field is going full blast, and Peter Penrose (John Mills) is the base’s new arrival. Everyone thinks he’s pretty green, but the base’s big cheese, David Archdale (Michael Redgrave) has high hopes for him. Penrose fits right in, and even meets a girl, Iris (Renee Asherson) when David goes down to the Golden Lion Hotel to see his fiancee, Toddie (Rosamund John). Mr. Palmer (Stanley Holloway) owns it, but Toddy runs it and everyone knows her.

It all moves forward at a pretty good clip, and Toddy and David are married and have a son, Peter. Unfortunately, though, David is killed when he crashes into a hill while on a mission in France, leaving Toddy and Peter at the hotel.

It’s around that time when the Americans arrive to take co-command of Halfpenny Field, and naturally they’re boisterous, slangy, don’t warm teapots at teatime, a wee bit rude, and like a ghastly brown spread called peanut butter.

It doesn’t take long, though, for everyone to get to be friends, and Toddie strikes up a friendship with Johnny Hollis (Douglass Montgomery), one of the pilots. The kids in the village all adopt him, calling him “Uncle Johnny.” The company has raucous parties at the Golden Lion Hotel, with everyone singing around the piano and Mr. Palmer assisting.

Penrose, on the other hand, is racked with guilt over what happened to David and doesn’t want put Iris through what Toddie went through with David so he basically freezes her out. Iris is about to break, though, because she’s been living with her aunt, Miss Winterton (Joyce Carey), and Iris has just about had enough of her sour attitude. Penrose might want to move fast before Iris bolts.

For a movie about the Royal Air Force and the Army Air Force, The Way To the Stars is pretty quiet, albeit very interesting. It’s not so much about the derring-do these pilots achieve when they’re out  on missions, but the relationships they form with each other and the civilians around them. The Brits, not hampered by the Production Code, are able to let fly certain mild profanities their American counterparts could only dream about.

The cultural differences are fun, too. Not to be stereotypical or anything, but I’m always amazed at how good Brits are at underplaying something while they still convey so much. The Americans, however, are just the opposite, saying a lot but not conveying as much as quickly. At the same time, though, both groups have their own kind of sincerity, and it’s cool to see everyone meet in the middle. For some reason, though, everyone talks super fast as if they all know they’re on borrowed time, which some of the characters are.

It was also fun seeing so many familiar British actors, such as a young John Mills and Michael Redgrave, who I always like coming across. It’s also fun seeing Sterling Holloway, who I’ve never seen outside of My Fair Lady, so it’s cool to find some of his other work. Eagle-eyed viewers might enjoy seeing Trevor Howard in his first credited role and Jean Simmons in a very brief appearance as a singer. So yeah, there are lots of surprises.

The Way To the Stars made a respectable-although-tiny $5.3 million at the box office, or around a quarter of a million dollars in today’s money, so it’s safe to say the Brits liked the movie better than the Americans. The reviews weren’t bad; Motion Picture Herald said, ” It’s gay, boisterous, magnificent, stirring entertainment of the premier choice.”

Variety raved, “Not the least interesting thing is the camera technique. Instead of many arial shots, the camera is grounded entirely…Despite technically perfect performances by the three male principals–Michael Redgrave, John Mills and Douglass Montgomery–Rosamund John actually walks away with the acting honors in a part as devoid of glamor as it is rich in feminine charm.”

Ultimately the film has followed its respective trajectories in Britain and the United States. It’s still shown at repertory screenings in Britain, but in America it’s barely noticed, if at all. It’s too bad, because it’s an underrated gem about a topic that would have been familiar to British flyers and a select few American Army Air Force personnel.

For more of the Rule, Britannia Blogathon, please see Terence at A Shroud of Thoughts. Thanks for bringing this one back, Terence–it was great! Thanks for reading, all, and I hope to see you on Wednesday for another post…

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The Way To the Stars is available on DVD from Amazon. It’s also free to stream on YouTube.

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