The Warrior Strain
Young Lord Billy sniffs out sneaky German marauders in this flag-waving war drama - thrills for British boys, 1919-style.
Lonely young Lord Billy, who misses his dear departed mother, has nothing to do but lounge about the castle all day while his father, the Earl, attends to important affairs of state - until the noble lad joins the Army Cadets. Rising through the ranks to become the Lance Corporal of his squad, patrolling undefended points along the English coast, he's soon on the trail of German marauders.
This resolutely patriotic British thriller from prolific American-born director and screenwriter Floyd Martin Thornton didn't see release until 1919 - by which time WWI was over. Its cheery, fanciful glorification of youthful involvement in the war effort stands in stark contrast to a reality that had seen millions of young servicemen massacred in a bloody conflict.
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Cinema of WWI
A young film industry just settling into its own home - the cinema - found itself enlisted to record, report and dramatise a war unlike any other.
The films made during and just after World War I have a special directness, untainted as they are by layers of mythologising and cliché built up over the decades. There is a great variety of news, comedy and heartrending drama. A genre unique to this period of film production is the battle reconstruction film: the film equivalent of the stone memorials still to be found in every town and village of the UK.
11 videos in this collection
1
2
The Lads of the Village
3
Hedd Wyn
4
Nurse and Martyr
5
The German Spy Peril
6
East Is East
7
The Somme
8
How Kitchener Was Betrayed
9
The Man Who Came Back
10
Conscription
11