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Release Date: June 4, 1942. Running Time: 133 minutes. Screenplay: Arthur Wimperis, George Froeschel, James Hilton, Claudine West. Based on the book by: Jan Struther. Producer: Sidney Franklin. Director: William Wyler.
THE PLOT:
Kay Miniver (Greer Garson) and her husband Clem (Walter Pidgeon) are ordinary members of the English upper middle class. They have a family, they go to church, and they live perhaps at the outer edge of their means. They have two young children, as well as an older son, Vin (Richard Ney), who is studying at Oxford. Life is simple, predictable, and good.
Then Germany invades Poland and, shortly after, the United Kingdom is officially at war with Germany and its allies. Initially, the war seems distant. Sure, there are air raid drills. But, as Lady Beldon (Dame May Whitty) declares, there is no real chance the Germans would dare to bomb them. Gradually, however, war draws closer. Vin leaves Oxford to join the Royal Air Force. Clem and his boat are called on to aid in the evacuation at Dunkirk. A German pilot is shot down over their village, leaving locals scrambling to search for him.
Then the bombs begin falling, signaling that the once-distant conflict is here, leaving the family to endure with as much dignity as they can manage...
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CHARACTERS:
Kay Miniver: It's interesting to contrast Kay Miniver (Greer Garson) with Cavalcade's Jane Marryot. Both are ordinary English women seen against major world events, and both are presented as icons of their respective eras. But while Jane only worked as a character in Cavalcade's first third, deteriorating into a dreary symbol thereafter, Kay actually engages. We see her fearing for her son when he joins the RAF, then for her husband when he joins the Dunkirk evacuation. She comes face to face with a German pilot, moving from terror at his nationality and weapon to sympathy for his youth and arm injury - and then to anger, when he parrots Nazi propaganda at her. Cavalcade fails (in my opinion) because it loses focus and ignores Jane for large periods. Mrs. Miniver works because it stays with the title character, showing the major events from her perspective throughout.
Clem Miniver: Mrs. Miniver is the second consecutive Best Picture winner starring Walter Pidgeon. Though he was cast in some fine films, I've often found Pidgeon to be a bit wooden. This was very much the case in How Green Was My Valley, where he often seemed to be posing rigidly in contrast to the more natural screen actors surrounding him. He's much more relaxed here, and he and Garson have a natural screen rapport which makes them feel like an authentic couple.
Carol Beldon: Teresa Wright won the Supporting Actress Oscar as Lady Beldon's granddaughter, who quickly becomes the object of affection for the Minivers' eldest son, Vin. She is introduced when he comes down from Oxford, riding pompously high on academic readings about the English class system. She brightly and politely punctures his pomposity, asking what he's been doing about his deeply held beliefs. "I know how comfortable it is to curl up with a book full of big words and think you're going to solve all the problems of the universe, but you're not - a bit of action is required now and then." Carol remains the more mature of the two throughout. She is realistic about how abruptly the war may end their relationship, frankly talking with Mrs. Miniver about how determined she is to enjoy her time with Vin. "If I must lose him, there'll be time enough for tears."
Vin: What's most revealing about Vin is how often he's referred to as a "boy." When he proposes to Carol, Kay sells her son to Lady Beldon by calling him a "nice boy." Carol hesitates about his exuberance, calling him a "crazy boy," and fearing that he won't stay crazy about her forever. When he enlists and is made Pilot Officer, he is enthused about how quickly it happened... even as his parents exchange glances that show their recognition that the haste to get pilots in the air is not a good thing. He grows in maturity throughout, but it's only in a thoughtful gesture in the movie's last scene that he shows himself as more than the "infant" Lady Beldon accused him of being.
Lady Beldon: Dame May Whitty, as the local aristocrat, is initially presented as a one-dimensional figure, a personification of the exact class snobbery that "Oxford Vin" rails against. She hosts an annual flower show, and it's a scandal that this year a commoner has dared to enter his rose when she has always entered unopposed. She resists Vin and Carol when they insist she respond appropriately to an Air Raid siren, and sniffs that the Air Raid Warden is a "little person" using the war "to become important." When she tries to protest Vin and Carol's engagement, however, she doesn't argue out of class snobbery, but rather out of memories of losing her own husband to the First World War so soon after their own marriage. She also admits that Carol is too strong-willed (read: too much like her) for her opinion to matter anyway.
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UNABASHED WAR PROPAGANDA:
"Propaganda worth 100 battleships!"
-British Prime Minister Winston Churchill
"(Mrs. Miniver)'s refined powerful propagandistic tendency has up to now only been dreamed of. There is not a single angry word spoken against Germany; nevertheless the anti-German tendency is perfectly accomplished."
-Nazi Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels
It is impossible to replicate the experience of watching Mrs. Miniver in 1942. This was a big Hollywood picture that portrayed the early days of the Second World War, from the German invasion of Poland to the start of the Blitz, at a time when these events were recent and vivid in the minds of British moviegoers, who so warmly embraced this American-made film about English perseverance that it made almost as much money in the UK as it did in the US.
That it was a propaganda film isn't in question. Director William Wyler was proud to acknowledge it as such. The film ends with a sermon, in a church scarred by bombing, that is addressed more to the audience than to the characters:
"We have buried our dead, but we shall not forget them. Instead, they will inspire us with an unbreakable determination to free ourselves and those who come after us from the tyranny and terror that threaten to strike us down. This is the people's war! It is our war!"
This speech was reprinted in publications of the time, and copies of it were translated into multiple languages and dropped over German-occupied territories in Europe. In the film, it is followed by a closing image, seen through one of the many gaps in the church's roof: British planes, flying in perfect formation... and then, after the credits, with a direct call to the audience to buy war bonds with every paycheck.
Still, like many other movies of the era that were unabashed propaganda, Mrs. Miniver also stands up as a genuinely good movie, one that remains enjoyable even outside that historical context.
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| The Minivers' eldest son, Vin (Richard Ney), falls for Carol Beldon (Teresa Wright). |
THOUGHTS:
Though the story is presented episodically, it has been carefully structured. The opening Act establishes the characters in pre-war normalcy, as Kay and Clem guiltily indulge in their own extravagant purchases. All the principals are introduced efficiently: Kay and the vicar share a train car with Lady Beldon; Clem and the young children are introduced on her return home; Vin and Carol are introduced in the very next scenes. The thread of the flower show is also introduced in these opening minutes, with upstart competitor Mr. Ballard (Henry Travers) daring to enter his rose - "The Mrs. Miniver," after Kay grants her permission - against Lady Beldon, in a thread that will continue until the very end of the picture.
The arrival of the war is announced at a church service, a scene in which all the major characters are visible. From here, focus is split between Air Raid preparations and the romance between Vin and Carol, but a sense of overall normalcy remains.
The film's centerpiece changes that. At about the 60-minute mark, Clem is called away for what is revealed to be participation in the Dunkirk evacuation. With both him and Vin gone, Kay is left alone. After a brief exchange that keeps the "rose" subplot alive, she encounters the downed German pilot. She is initially terrified, but his youth and obvious fear make her sympathetic to a young man who obviously reminds her of Vin. He responds to her kindness by savagely boasting of the European cities destroyed by the German war machine, declaring, "We will do the same thing here!" She slaps him... but even this parroting of Nazi propaganda recalls Vin's own parroting of his academic readings at the start of the film, something which I doubt is accidental, and the young German pilot ultimately seems as much a victim of war as anyone else.
After that scene, the tone becomes increasingly grim. There's an extended scene with the family in their shelter, riding out a bombing run while doing all they can to maintain a semblance of normality: Kay reading to the children, Clem smoking a pipe, the two almost aggressive in their discussions of mundane plans for the following day. This leads into the final Act, in which the family is changed forever... and which even audiences in 1942 were all too aware marked just the beginning of what they still had to face.
The movie is effective in its storytelling, making the mundane (young romance; the winning rose at the flower show) as important as the wartime story. In pacing and style, however, Mrs. Miniver often feels like a backward step. In the late 1930s and early '40's, more and more filmmakers were starting their scenes as late as possible, with characters already in conversation or action, and cutting out of scenes at dramatic high points. This film follows the style more favored in the early '30s, with scenes beginning with characters' entrances and continuing until they exit, which makes it feel at times both slower and stagier than its contemporaries. It by no means destroys the film... but I think some tighter editing might have helped the pace, and I suspect modern viewers will do a bit of seat-shifting and watch-checking early in the film.
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| Lady Beldon (Dame May Whitty) wrestles with the announcement of the winning rose at her annual show. |
REMAKES AND RETELLINGS:
Mrs. Miniver was remade at least three times: in 1943, as a radio serial; in 1960, as a television movie starring Maureen O'Hara; and in 2015, as a musical stage adaptation. The movie also received a sequel, 1950's The Miniver Story. Both Greer Garson and Walter Pidgeon returned, but director William Wyler did not. Also not returning: Vin Miniver, given that Garson had both married and divorced actor Richard Ney in the intervening years. The film, a soaper which gives Mrs. Miniver an illness to bravely suffer through, fared poorly with both critics and audiences, and is largely regarded as an ill-advised footnote.
OVERALL:
As wartime propaganda, Mrs. Miniver's portrayal of the courage of ordinary people trying to maintain a sense of normalcy during wartime proved more effective than any number of pictures portraying battlefield heroics. Even outside that context, the characters remain relatable, as does the portrayal of a war that intrudes gradually, almost by inches, into daily life. It holds up as an enjoyable motion picture, well worth seeing for viewers willing to have patience with its early pacing issues.
Overall Rating: 8/10.
Outstanding Motion Picture - 1941: How Green Was My Valley
Outstanding Motion Picture - 1943: Casablanca
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