A pro-British movie? About Queen Victoria? The historian Andrew Roberts gives us the astonishing news:
For decades Hollywood has treated its audiences like morons, straitjacketing complex historical issues into goodies versus baddies. A classic example is the recent release Valkyrie, in which the German generals' assassination plot against Hitler is presented as having been launched in order to promote human rights and the decent treatment of minorities. The fact that Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, the undeniably brave would-be assassin described Poles as "an unbelievable rabble" of "Jews and mongrels" is conveniently forgotten.
The Young Victoria, released in Britain next month, could not be more different. In it we experience the joy of witnessing the highly political Bedchamber Crisis of 1839 being acted out between the Whig Lord Melbourne and the Tory Sir Robert Peel, something I never thought I would ever see on the silver screen. Like A Man For All Seasons and Oliver Cromwell, two excellent historical movies also based closely on fact, Victoria works because the viewer is not patronised or told what to think.
A movie with a scene about The Bedchamber Crisis? I'm about to faint. Could a movie about the repeal of the Corn Laws be far off? Snap out of it. Snap. Out. Of. It.
It is probably too much to hope that Hollywood has fundamentally altered its view of the English – we are still the minority it's totally safe to be racist towards – but Victoria allows us a glimpse of how good Hollywood history movies could be if they didn't exude such prejudice against us and our past.
I'm not sure if racist is quite the word. The older usage of race roughly corresponds to ethnicity today. In the modern sense the British are not a race, nor are they really an ethnicity. Though Canadian census forms do consider British to be an ethnicity. British is a nationality (unless Mr Salmond has his way). It's a quibble, I know. Roberts' essential point is correct. There are things you get away with saying and implying about Britain and the British that would land you before a court in many countries, if said about anyone else.
I look forward to seeing it.
ReplyDeleteAs to British, I'm not sure what it is really. I consider myself to be an Englishman, and British, despite being born in Australia. I am also Australian. I see no contradiction. My family is all British stock going back to the Conquest, I was raised reading British literature and watching British television and cinema. I am not, however, a citizen of Great Britain. Ethnically I suppose I am British, culturally certainly. But in terms of nationality, no. Which matters the most? In my opinion, culture.
Race is a false construct anyway, there is ethnicity as dictated by genetics and culture as dictated by environment (and choice).
Lord Best, an interesting take on things. Here in NZ when one fills out a census form and has to choose your ethnicity you can be:
ReplyDeleteEuropean (if caucasian), or
Fijian,
Tokelauan,
Tuvalauian,
Cook Islander,
Samoan,
Solomon Islander,
Nuiean,
Tongan,
Vanawatuian...etc etc
I for one, fail to see that there is a more significant ethinic difference between Cook Islanders and Tongans than between an Ulsterman and a Greek!
Personally I would consider myself "British" in the same sense that we used to be described on our passports as New Zealand citizens and British subjects, and the common base NZ culture rests on the bed-rock inherited from Britian.
I saw this in the cinema a year ago, in Ireland. It's quite good. Strange that it's only being released in Britain now.
ReplyDeleteLord Best, I share your situation. Born in Canada, as Canadian as any of my fellows, but British to the boots. Often mocked for it, as British is indeed the minority it is 'safe' to be discriminatory towards. I've been called a Limey, a "Britfag" and other things far less pleasant. But no matter! As Gilbert & Sullivan wrote in 'HMS Pinafore'
ReplyDeleteHe is an Englishman!
For he himself has said it,
And it's greatly to his credit,
That he is an Englishman!
For he might have been a Roosian,
ReplyDeleteA French, or Turk, or Proosian,
Or perhaps Itali-an!
Or perhaps Itali-an!
But in spite of all temptations
To belong to other nations,
He remains an Englishman!
He remains an Englishman!
On the subject of "Englishness", I have recently been re-reading an excellent history of Elizabethan settlement in America. It contains an excellent quote; the local indian chief enquired if the strange white settler where gods, to which the reply was "no, the next best thing, we're English"!
ReplyDeleteAlthough the UK may not last forever in its current format, the term "British" will always best summarise my ethnic ancestry. My ancestors, via one route or another, snake back to all parts of the British Isles (both sides in Ireland, north and south in Scotland, established and dissenters in England). It is the one word that encapsulates my ancestry, because it encapsulates the historical moment when those islands were one national unit. Imperial hang-ups about the word - like flying a Union Jack - might have made sense in the 60s or 70s in an rebellious, adolescent sort of way, but strangely, not now. It is the only word sufficiently inclusive.
ReplyDeleteThe article says English, not British. I am British but not English. There is not a little anti-English feeling in many parts of Great Britain!
ReplyDeleteThis comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
ReplyDeleteI am eagerly anticipating this Movie, which was directed by a French-Canadian!
ReplyDeleteI myself, am (Anglican) Anglo-Irish Briton who is a Canadian Citizen and National.
None of this would have been shocking to my ancestors as Imperial Citizenship was always triangular.
Wouldn't the "nations" of the British isles (English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Manx, perhaps Cornish) be the ethnicities or nationalities, while British is an umbrella term that comprises the joint heritage of the lot? In the old colonies, a mixing of the aforementioned groups could lead to a British ethnicity, though we often just call the mix whatever the colonial name is ("American" as in "Old American"). Throw in a Frenchman, a German, and a Serb or two, and you pretty soon get a homogenous new ethnicity. That was the idea -- for a time . . .
ReplyDelete