FORGOTTEN GEM? Queen and Country (2014)

 

          

                In 1987, John Boorman released a little gem of a movie entitled “Hope and Glory”.  The dramedy was set in the Battle of Britain and was the story of a typical British family.  The main character was a lad named Billy.  The movie consisted of a series of vignettes chronicling the effects of the war on the Rohan family.  The movie was nominated for Best Picture and remains one of the best WWII homefront films.  I recently rewatched it and still find it charming, if unchallenging.  I discovered that Boorman had recently made a sequel, so naturally I looked forward to revisiting the characters.  I don’t know what took so long, but it was 27 years.  (Hell, it was only ten years between “Gettysburg” and “Gods and Generals”.)  The movie was screened at the Cannes Film Festival.

                The movie is set twelve years after the original.  It is now 1952 and Great Britain is in the Korean War.  Bill (Callum Turner) is now 18 and living at his grandpa’s house.  He gets conscripted into Britain’s new not-just-volunteers army.  He is not thrilled.  The boot camp montage takes him and his motley crew from buffoons to marching elites in two minutes.  Suddenly, he and his mate Percy (Caleb Landry Jones) are sergeants and are not shipped to Korea because Britain needs someone to teach typing to clerks.  This opening signals that the movie is not going to be interested in reality, or the war.  The plot inserts the usual service comedy tropes.  Sgt. Maj. Barkley (David Thewlis) is their by the book nemesis.  We get comic relief from the ace skiver (British slang for slacker) Redmond (Pat Shortt).  Bill is the stick in the mud virgin who will be corrupted by the ladies’ man wannabe Percy.  Each gets a romantic arc- Bill with a mentally unstable femme fatale and Percy with a tramp.  They get into some scrapes to add drama, but its not like they are fighting in a war.

                Some things are best left alone.  One of those things is the Rohan family.  In 27 years they lost all their charm.  None of the characters in the movie are appealing, including Bill.  If the setting was not the grandpa’s house, you would have a hard time recognizing that this is the same Rohan family.   The film has the unoriginal theme that the brass (e.g. Bradley) are asses, but so are the enlisted.  The cast is a big drop from the originals (only Billy’s father is played by the same actor).  The other theme is that the Queen’s England (Elizabeth gets crowned) is going to be different than the King’s.  The changes are affecting society and the army.  But the movie is very shallow in its treatment of this theme.  You could easily miss it, but it won’t be because you are laughing too loud.  The humor is lame and the drama is tepid.

                  I did not expect much from “Queen and Country”, but I got less than I expected. No wonder the movie did not make a splash.  It certainly fits in the tradition that sequels usually suck.  Surprisingly, the movie got favorable reviews, but I have to believe that the critics were viewing it with no reference to the original.  However, even if you are not comparing the two, this movie is not good.  Frankly, I wish I had not found out about it.

GRADE  =  D