This is England: British film and the People's War 1939-1945

Abstract

The title of this book is borrowed from that of a Crown Film Unit (CFU) film, a propaganda short made during World War II. The film in question was called 'The Heart of Britain' when released in Britain by was renamed 'This Is England' for release in the United States of America. I have adopted the title for its ironic potential. The change in name is no doubt reflected the perception that to Americans "England" and "Britain" were synonymous. It is also true that to a large extent the propaganda filmmakers in Britain during the war thought the same way. The images of Britain they were concerned to produce and repeat in the name of the propaganda imperative of "the people's war" were those of a mythical England. Only occasionally, and with more than a hint of tokenism, did they remember to include, for example, the "Celtic fringe" or Britain in their images of national identity. Indeed, the images of England that were made to stand duty for Britain as a whole were more often than not those of an England drawn from idyllic (even bucolic) and nostalgic images, if they had any basis in reality, of the southeast of England, tempered by the images of the metropolis of London. I will touch upon this in many ways in my examination of individual films, documentary and fictional, which constitute the body of this work.