« Well, He did say "Country First", didnt he? | Main | How To Stop Piracy: A Primer »

Movie Alert - Decision Against Time (1957)

Decision Against Time, a 1957 Ealing Studios film. I managed to catch this last night after recording it from TCM. This is a fantastic movie on many levels but it catches my attention for one reason. No, its not just because there are aircraft in the film (a criteria that I often use to evaluate movies) its because the movie shows life from a perspective that is not often seen in film or literature.

This movie shows life from the perspective of a man. Sound silly to say such a thing, but its true. Most film and literature talks about life from the perspective of a woman or a mother. Rarely is there any examples of the view of life from the eyes of a father or husband. This is one very good solid example of that perspective.

Jack Hawkins plays a test pilot of a struggling post-war aircraft company. Jack is also struggling to provide for his family and is not able to afford buying a new home for his wife. He goes to work and is informed by the company CEO that unless they can sell the aircraft that Jack is testing that they will all be out of work within a month.

Jack then takes the aircraft for a test flight with the potential new customer for the aircraft. Naturally, something goes wrong on the aircraft, a fire breaks out in one of the engines and Jack is forced to make some very tough decisions. Should he save himself and bail out with the rest of the crew? or should he stay with the aircraft which would cause him to lose his life but might possibly allow the company to discover the nature of the problem with the aircraft and manage to stay in business afterwards. While this ocdcurs in the air, on the ground, the factory workers for the doomed aircraft company gaze skyward knowing that their fate is tied to the decisions of this one man. They want him to live, but they also want to be employed and working. They realize that they cant have both. They ponder their own humanity as Jack circles the airfield, burning off fuel. News reporters on the scene are told that unless there is a crash there is no story and with no story they wont get paid. Should they hope for a crash just to make a few dollars? or hope for the life of the man in the aircraft.

There is also a debate among the factory workers about whether or not to tell Jacks wife about the pending disaster. Shouldnt we tell her? How does that Help? Maybe she can talk to Jack, talk some sense into him. Its into this environment on the ground that Jacks wife finds that she has to deal with the fact that Jack has taken this very large, life threatening risk with his life and their family security.

She simply doesnt understand why he would do such a thing. Is this a macho thing? Why would he do it? All the other Pilots say they would never take such a risk.

Suffice to say, Jack explains it to her. Its a riveting scene that explains to many people the decisions that men and husbands often face in their lives that other people, particulary wives, simply dont understand.

"Lawrence of Arabia" fans will enjoy the work of Jack Hawkins( Col. Allenby in Lawrence) in this film as well as the actor Howard Marion-Crawford, who plays the reporter in this movie. In Lawrence, he plays the role of the British Military Doctor introduced in the initial scenes of the movie as "an admirer of Col. Lawrence" saying that "he never met the great man personally". It's only later in the film do you see that he did meet Lawrence and slapped him to the ground when he sees the appaling conditions of the hospital that he takes over from Lawrence, not realizing that the man he had slapped to the ground was in fact the same man he to which he would later offer high praise on the steps of St. Pauls Cathedral.

Posted @ November 18, 2008 09:13 AM | Current Affairs

TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://varifrank.com/MT/mt-tb.cgi/1210