Aprendendo a Ser Homem

Comparisons with 'Goodbye, Mr Chips', 'The Winslow Boy' and 'The Browning Version' are inevitable, but this film just hasn't quite got the chops to compete. It's fascinating as a pseudo-historical record of public school life in the mid-19th Century, but the story fails to engage fully. However, it's an innocent enough way to pass the time without boring you rigid. Damned with faint praise.

The film appears to show people who felt they knew what right was and who acted in harmony with that inner conviction , right as the bible describes it to be for the school headmaster reads the parable of seed from the bible and otherwise quotes from it, and appears to be a living example of its precepts in his comportment. His reasonableness is most winsome especially in the scene where he rebukes the younger teacher for lack of respect toward the older teachers, notwithstanding the fact that he agrees with the younger teachers argument, he nonetheless criticises the way he presented it. The compelling invisible force that made people believe that they knew the right they felt was....was ..right and the subsequent belief that good would eventually triumph over bad, evil, naughtiness call it what you like, is undeniable in this film, and if Flashman is symbolic of the axis of evil, then maybe expulsion of them is mankinds only hope. Who will do the expelling? Who decides what is right? Evil? I love films that get you thinking!

Old-fashioned British film-making at its best, taking a literary classic, in this case Thomas Hughes's novel of the same name, and simply re-telling the tale in an un-flashy (pardon the pun) manner.

Reportedly faithful to the book source (although I've read the book, it was donkeys years ago, as a boy), the film certainly seems to accurately recreate the cloistered world of private boarding schools of the early 19th Century and all the calumnies which occurred on campus, none worse than the established but nefarious practice of older-form boys requiring the first-year intake to "fag" for them, which basically meant them doing any kind of menial task considered beneath their elders. The point is made in the film that most of the teaching staff were aware of and indeed condoned the practice, probably because they'd been through it themselves and took the view that it was a necessary rite of passage on the path to manhood. Utter nonsense, of course, it was authorised institutional bullying, involving both psychological and physical abuse, usually combined at the same time with anyone trying to change the status quo, such as one of the junior masters or even the humanitarian headmaster Dr Thomas Arnold, denounced as reformers, terrible thing.

Into this battle-, sorry, school-ground comes young Tom Brown, a reserved boy of eleven who despite making friends his own age soon learns his place at the bottom of the school hierarchy and worse, comes into the orbit of the school's most notorious bully, Flashman, who takes an immediate dislike to him and tries to make his life a misery. But young Tom, despite being pushed to his limits, is no quitter and finds a way to get back at his tormentor by learning a new skill over the summer break.

The climax of the film involves Tom and a couple of his chums carrying out a brave and selfless act which sees one of their number face a life or death struggle while the rescued party, in classic blame-avoidance fashion tries to twist the truth for their own ends.

Thankfully truth will out and helped along by a healthy dose of Christian prayer, wrongs are righted although you suspect Dr Arnold might need to apply some root and branch treatment to rid the school of some of the more ingrained practices perpetrated by both senior staff and pupils.

I could have done without the forced religiosity at the end and unsurprisingly some of the child acting is a little stiff and wooden in places but there's no denying this is a rattling good tale with an exemplary young hero who learns fast how to handle himself in an alien environment (I had to smile at the second-year Tom calling his new protege "young 'un"). Young John Howard Davies and Robert Newton are happily reunited from David Lean's "Oliver Twist" three years before, the latter in a markedly different role, while John Forrest shines as the venal, rascally Flashman.

A success at the U.K. box-office with its example of the national stiff upper lip to a land still enduring the stringencies of post-war rationing and all that, it's an entertaining, well-made British drama with an underlying anti-bullying message still highly topical today.

John Howard Davies - probably most famous for his portrayal of orphan "Oliver Twist" in David Lean's classic - is a little too weedy, for me, as the title character in this adaptation of Thomas Hughes' story about a young boy sent to the prestigious Rugby School in the 1830's where he encounters bullies; brutality and ultimately kindness. Robert Newton turns in a great performance as "Dr. Arnold" who believes that the somewhat cruel educational practices are of the past, and so he and "Tom Brown" try to improve things. This film is not so faithful to the book; but uses the two lead performances, as well as a convincing effort from John Forrest as his nemesis "Flashman", to convey much of it's sentiment. I probably preferred the 1940 version, but there's not much in it.

'Tom Brown's School Days', one of the best depictions of schoolboy life in literature, was previously adapted in 1940. While not the truest to the source material either, that was also a good film, especially for Cedric Hardwicke's performance, and it is hard to say which is the better one out of that and this film.

1951's adaptation is not perfect. The direction is a bit staid and lacklustre, Robert Stevenson in the 1940 film directed with more sympathy, energy and style to me, here the direction is not bad, just that it could have been more.

The story is sometimes a little too episodically told, and while it's well paced on the whole there are occasions where it sags. John Howard Davies is more age appropriate than Jimmy Lydon and has cuteness and charm, but is also a little too delicate and wistful in the title role, which due to being the main focus is more interestingly written, the earlier version focusing more on Arnold.

However, 'Tom Brown's School Days' looks great, beautifully shot and the period setting is suitably atmospheric and quaint. Richard Adinsell's score complements well and has the right amount of jauntiness and whimsy as well as stirring atmosphere. The script is very thought-provoking, with some nice charming, humorous and poignant moments, and much of the story is charming and lively, with Arnold's strictness and progressiveness and Flashman's very vindictive bullying (to the point of being reprehensible, have to agree that one cannot feel sympathy for him as a result) very well-realised.

Particularly notable here in 'Tom Brown's School Days' is the acting. A more restrained than usual Robert Newton gives an authoritative and very sincere performance as strict but saintly Arnold, while John Clarlesworth is appealing as East and John Forrest comes very close to stealing the show making for a viciously snobbish and quite intimidating bully in Flashman. Supporting turns are splendid, though some are brief.

Overall, solid film with the acting being especially noteworthy. 7/10 Bethany Cox