Tawny Pipit

When convalescing RAF pilot Niall MacGinnis and his nurse, Rosamund John, are out bird watching in rural Gloucestershire, they spot a Tawny Pipit -- not just one, but only the second nesting pair in English history. They rouse the entire village to protect these visitors in a wartime paean to British kindliness and back-country values.

Bernard Miles and Charles Saunders co-direct from a script of their own devising. Miles also acts in heavy make up as a wheel-chair bound military man. It's a well-told story, but very heavy-handed in its subtextual message, as the local Church choir sings a composition about the birds, and later regales a visiting Soviet sniper with "The Internationale", in a sequence in which Miles gives her his old machine gun and Land Girl Jean Gillie wonders if she would be as good a shot were the old Land of Hope and Glory invaded.

I can't help but compare this to the sort of movie that Ealing would become famous for; this comes off as beating the matter to death, with few of the oddly endearing eccentrics that Ealing would use to make its central theme clear. Still, it's very watchable throughout with some good performances.

Truly beautiful and atmospheric British film made in rural UK during WW2, Tawny Pippit shows the delicate balance sought during a dangerous time. All the adjectives apply as it is charming and delightful and especially emotional given the war was raging and this gently kind film offers an insight into the human condition. Other films like A BOY A GIRL AND A BIKE or the 1959 version of THE 39 STEPS allow international viewers to really appreciate the Brit humor of the countryside. There is a German film made in the alps late during the war about a shepherd and the fauna and flora as a paradise balance to the war raging nearby (I don't know its title) and TAWNY PIPPIT is almost a British counterpart. Young viewers might find it all a bit Dad's Army, but mature viewers will get the lovely feeling this films wants you to have.

The film was largely shot in Lower Slaughter and is a fascinating historical record of the Cotswolds during WW2. Today Lower Slaughter is a much visited village; the buildings are largely unchanged and the mill wheel still turns, if only for show. In "An eye for a Bird" 1970 Eric Hosking, who was the ornithological advisor for the film wrote : "It was decided that it was quite impossible to contemplate filming an actual tawny pipit; it nests mainly on the Continent where the war was raging. It was decided to photograph a pair of ordinary meadow pipits and keep to shots which showed the back view only; the tawny has a plain breast and the meadow a speckled one, but their back plumage is very similar."

Tawny Pipit was filmed in and around Bourton-on-the-Water, in Gloucestershire. I know this because my mother is one of the children, front and center, in the church choir scene. She was one of those children evacuated from London, and living with her grandparents during the war. I have been searching the world for a copy of this on video, but apparently it has never been been released to video. I sure wish it was. My mother is now 65, and would love to possess it as a memento of her childhood.

In the early days of American TV, what with the battles raging between the major studios and the new and growing industry, almost the only films available for showing on the new medium were fairly obscure Poverty Row movies (often from defunct studios) and films from Great Britain. From 1950 up to the time that the major Hollywood studios got into TV (say 1955 to 1957) young Anglophile film lovers like myself were privileged to view dozens and dozens, probably into the hundreds, of British-made films, both big and small, and by doing so gain a lifelong love for classic British acting styles, whether practiced by Eric Portman over there or by Ronald Colman over here. One of the films that was always listed in those days was TAWNY PIPIT, yet I never saw it until last night, mainly because when I, as a kid, saw the film listed, I had no idea what 'Tawny Pipit' meant - was it a condition? a place? a liquor? - and I was still unfamiliar with its lead actors, so I never watched it. I missed out on a lot.

This is a delightful film, one that could only have been made in England, showing a whole town - indeed, a whole culture - coming together to protect a bird - the Tawny Pipit - and its eggs, when this bird alights in one of its fields, only the second known incidence of the Pipit visiting Britain to hatch eggs. Since it is a wartime film, the patriotism rings both feverish and proper, and we quickly realize that the town has taken up the fight to protect the Pipit and its eggs not just for the Pipit's sake, but as a show of the rightness of the English Way of Life as against that of the Dreaded Hun (and they are called that several times), this even to the point of having something of a town celebration for the passing through of a Russian female sniper who has supposedly killed a thousand of the Dreaded Hun. Lucie Mannheim, a displaced German-Jewish actress, plays the short but showy role for all it is worth.

A few points regarding the actors. 1) Niall MacGinnis, our erstwhile young hero, played mainly tough seafaring types through much of his career but was immortalized on film for his absolutely iconic performance as Karswell, leader of a devil-worshiping cult in CURSE OF THE DEMON - one of the finest performances ever seen in a horror film. 2) Lucie Mannheim, our Russian heroine, was also the woman who gives rise to all of Robert Donat's consequent problems in THE 39 STEPS, when she is stabbed in the back shortly after meeting him; she was also the wife of that wonderful British actor Marius Goring for some 35 years. 3) Rosamund John, our leading lady, is, at this point in her career, almost unbearably pretty - not beautiful, but with a prettiness that rather transcends beauty - but she is known only to veteran Anglophile film lovers and had no international career. And 4) Bernard Miles, thanks to his acting, directing, producing, etc. (most especially on the stage) was actually created a Peer of the Realm - Lord Miles - before Laurence Olivier rose to that exalted status.

Anyway, this is a simple, lovely film, and if you could tear the kiddies away from their computer games long enough for them to develop an interest in something so laid-back and simple, they might benefit from it. I just did, and it's 65 years since I first decided to NOT watch the movie at their age.