La charge de la brigade légère

I do find it fascinating to come across obscure, almost forgotten films like this with familiar faces and famous actors in it. It was made ca. 1968, and in the true spirit of '68, it is strongly anti-war, anti-military, and anti-establishment, even though it is set in the Victorian era, the height of the Romantic age, when Military valor was largely celebrated. Military life is here portrayed in terms of ranks of men being bullied and brutalized by each successive rank above them, with the biggest, meanest and stupidest ones at the top.

I found it quite interesting to see the famous charge, celebrated in the romantic verses of Tennyson, portrayed in such a matter-of-fact manner as a series of tactical blunders due to bad communication and incompatible personalities among the commanders. These events were supposedly well-researched, and though I am not informed on the subject, I found this version of events very credible. Even with the high level of weapons and communications technology we have today, this sort of thing still happens. It must have been very common in centuries past.

To me, the dialog of this film and its delivery by the actors is its most remarkable feature. Seeing films that depict distant eras, I've often thought that these eras must have not just looked different from what we are used to, but sounded very different as well. If we were suddenly dropped into Victorian England, we wouldn't always understand what was being said or inferred to us. Words, phrases, gestures, facial expressions or body language that would have obvious meaning in that time and place would be strange to us. The language and syntax would, of course, be different, but so would the rhythm, pace, expressive color and accenting of the way people spoke. `Charge of the Light Brigade' does a remarkable job of not just looking, but sounding like a distant place and time. For a viewer who is not educated in antique British expressions and military jargon, as I am not, it makes watching this film a bit challenging, but it's like spending 130 minutes in the Victorian age as a so-called `fly-on-the-wall,' as the British put it. There was more than one line spoken after which I thought `say what?' But that's OK. It doesn't kill you, just encourages you to think a bit. This aspect of the film looks to be well-researched as well, a superb example of a somewhat talky script in which great care is taken with the language and its use by the actors. The script doesn't serve the purpose of an exposition device for the dumbest members of the audience, a very common vice in films, particularly big-money films engineered to alienate as few people as possible. It's an integral part of a design to recreate an unfamiliar time and place, and as such, a bit uncompromising.

So much of the hard part of making a movie about the Crimean War and those who fought there they got right, it's a shame the film-makers couldn't nail the last 30%.

The reenactment of Victorian society is impeccable. In dress, manner, and speech. The battle scenes, too, are remarkably faithful to the original locations and deployments, given the obvious limitations in budget and pre-CGI effects.

The actors playing they major characters, Raglan (Gielgud), Lucan (Andrews), and Cardigan (Howard) all do an excellent job.

And I actually likes the Punch-style animated cut scenes. There was, after all, no way they could show a fleet of several hundred war ships sailing into the Black Sea. Best not try.

So, the problems:

The charge, a comparatively minor screw-up book-ended by major Allied victories at the battles of the Alma and at Inkerman, was the result of a combination of small oversights, fog of war, and bad luck. So while there is a story to tell here there are no clear cut heroes except for the soldiers themselves, and certainly no villains.

So, to make a movie, you can choose either to change history and make larger than life, cartoon characters based on the exaggerated media reports of the day, and the 1950's book which was something of a anti- Cardigan hit piece, ... or you can play it straight, say "this is what it was like" and try to relate the experience, the esprit-de-corps, and yes, the interpersonal tensions, as raw as possible from the top of the command chain to the bottom.

This movie tries to have it both ways, it's cartoony but only for the intention of scoring cheap anti-war satire (all generals are imbeciles!), rather than to actually make the movie more enjoyable or engaging. When the war gets close and personal, it reverts back to just showing events... realistically, but with little or no emotional investment. The mechanics of the charge itself are done well, though.

And then the movie just ends, way too suddenly.

Now maybe, just maybe, Captain Nolan was supposed to be the "hero", the romantic sub-plot (distracting and totally irrelevant to the movie) seems to suggest it, but instead he just comes across as an impatient, vain, inexperienced know-it-all, a thin and unflattering caricature.

So, worth watching, but in better hands it could have been so much more.

This movie was made in 1968 but I never got the impression from watching it that it was anti war. The movie was made entirely with British actors and a British director and the Brits never had an antiwar movement (because their government gave up its militarism after Suez in 1955). The movie depicts the British army as it existed in 1850. This was a period when one gained advancement in the army by money or title. It was a largely decadent and unprofessional army and the movie I think characterizes it rather well. In fact, Nolan wrote a book complaining about the need to professionalize the army but it took the near disastrous Crimean War to affect any serious changes (it too the British Navy another generation or more to make similar changes). At the time, there was a debate about the effectiveness of cavalry with some believing that no defensive position could withstand the full force of a disciplined cavalry charge--a left over from the Napoleonic Wars--while others thought a charge into artillery was near suicidal. Nolan's roll in the battle remains controversial and whether he delivered inaccurate verbal orders to Acrdigan to charge to prove the effectiveness of cavalry even against artillery or warn the brigade away has not been established because Nolan was killed.

As for the Crimean War, it also depicts the drum beat to war accurately and the implication that most of the dying was done by commoners and much of the death was caused by disease. It was an ugly war. What isn't shown is that the condition of the Russian army was far worse. The poor Russian peasant soldiers were sent to fight with smoothbore Napeolonic Era muskets with an effective range of perhaps 100 meters while the British and the French was new rifled muskets with a range of over 300 meters. In some battles very small forces of British held off huge numbers of Russians killing hundreds.

The Battle of Balaclave is generally depicted accurately. It was a calamity of errors. Capt Nolan actually lost his head during the charge and witnesses indicate that his horse continued running with corpse in the saddle for some distance before the body collapsed. The charge was initiated by the heavy Brigade led by Lord Lucan. There was a rivalry between Lucan and Lord Cardigan (brothers in law) and both brigades initially made the charge but the Heavies did not enter the Valley of Death. The Light Brigade continued into the Valley and were decimated but not wiped out. In fact they were supported by the French cavalry the Chasseurs d'Afrique and the Russian positions were in fact overrun. I think the charge as depicted in this movie is one of the most exciting I have ever seen captured in the cinema.

The so called Valley of Death has changed considerably since the 1850s. By 1994, it was entirely planted in vineyards and the only way to gain some sense of the battle is to find the famous Tractir Bridge over the Tchernaya River and follow the lines of hills. As for the town of Balaclava...I have a photograph of the town in 1854 with the British fleet anchored in the harbor. I took a photograph of this village in 1994 from just about the same angle as the 1854 image and then compared the two. The place is completely unchanged with even the stone buildings remaining. Of course, the village today is the base of the Ukranian Black Sea fleet and there is a not so secret submarine base cared into the limestone cliffs inside the harbor.

We may think that the Crimean War is ancient history but the people of Crimea do not. They have sort of a living museum called the Panaorma. This is a museum devoted to the siege of Sevastopol. There is a circular path and the visitor is engulfed by the on going battles on both sides of the path. One may wander the hills above Sevastopol and many of the rifle pits and trenches from the war remain (they were reused by the Russians during the unsuccessful defense of the city in 1942). It is a wonderful museum and it exemplifies the Russian attitude that history is alive and they don't forget their past.

This is a historically accurate movie. It moves a little slow at times and it has some amusing cartoonish graphics (almost reminiscent of Monty Python graphics). All the major players obviously have a great deal of fun with their rolls.

Anecdotes: Tony Richardson's two children, Nastasha and Joely are in the film as well is his sister in law Vanessa Redgrave. I think I have these relationships correct. Anyway, they are all related.

I first saw THE CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE in the late 1970s when it was broadcast on the Sunday night " Film Of The Week " slot . I liked it as a young child , then saw it several years later and wasn't quite taken with it mainly down to the fact that the first half is very slow and the second half is grim and depressing

After just seeing it again about ten minutes ago I still hold my second opinion . I will congratulate ( With reservations ) the production team for making a very British type of historical epic , this is far more accurate than say ZULU which was ironically directed and co-written by a Hollywood film maker for a Hollywood studio and in that film Cy Endfield showed that perhaps you have to rewrite history ever so slightly to make a classic epic movie based upon actual events . Unfortunately by being as accurate as possible as a history lesson THE CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE resembles the critically panned ZULU DAWN rather than ZULU which is in many film critics top ten movies including mine

We learn that many British officers in the Victorian British army bought themselves their rank causing serious friction with officers who were totally professional soldiers who achieved their rank through talent . We learn how calvarymen train , we learn what goes on in the officers mess , we learn that the Crimean war was the first conflict to get major press coverage but all this does tend to hold the story up . It may run for just over two hours but the movie feels much longer .

A cast member ( I can't remember which one ) was interviewed several years ago and she mentioned the production team's eye for detail so much that many of the cast honestly thought they'd been transported back to the mid 19th century . She also mentioned packed crowds watching the film in cinemas on opening night but the crowds had totally disappeared within a couple of days . You can't help but feel the attention to historical detail had everything to do with the poor box office . I guess the audience were expecting something in the vein of ZULU

As I said I will congratulate the production team for their accuracy in fine detail but bewarned it is top heavy with social comment and if you have little interest in history you might want to watch the latest Hollywood blockbuster instead

We have to wait nearly two hours for the eponymous event which climaxes this film. Prior to this we see a series of apparently unconnected episodes which give the viewer an insight into the workings of Victorian society, including anti-intellectuallism and idleness among the 'upper' classes, and brutality and theft among the 'scum' recruited in the slums.

While almost plot less this section of the film does follow a core of characters whose lives are connected by army service. The main character is Captain Louis Nolan, an idealistic professional in an army of amateurs. "England is looking well" he says in the first scene of the film. The irony is that the country that looks so good is a cruel and mismanaged place. Unlike his fellow officers, who have bought their posts, he has worked his way up the ranks of the Indian Army by merit. He despises them and they feel he isn't a 'gentleman'.

Nolan has very definite views on how war should be fought. Faced with the reality of battle and the inadequacies of the commanders (the senile Raglan and the childish Lucan and Cardigan) his impatience and temper have tragic consequences as he impetuously points the Light Brigade ("There, my Lord, is your enemy, there are your guns!") towards the bloody fiasco of which he is the first victim. The man who seems to know best makes the biggest blunder of all. Eye-witnesses said the hideous scream Nolan gave when he was hit stayed with them all their lives and the film re-creates it in a truly chilling way.

Although the film does reflect 1960's attitudes to war and politics (and I actually prefer these to the attitudes of the 21st Century) its setting is so perfectly realized that it hasn't dated as a '60s film'. In fact it seems better with the passage of time. If you can free yourself from the idea of a narrative history and give yourself up to a series of impressions which add new layers of understanding 'Charge of the Light Brigade' makes a fine historical film.