Another country

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“Another Country” - British movie (1984) based on the award winning play by Julian Mitchell. Directed by Marek Kanievska. Main cast: Rupert Everett as Guy Bennett, as Michael Jenn as Tommy Judd,Colin Firth as Barclay, Robert Addie as Delahay, Rupert Wainwright as Donald Devenish, Tristan Oliver as Fowler, Cary Elwes as James Harcourt, Frederick Alexander as Jim Menzies, Geoffrey Bateman as Yevgeni and others.

It is not an easy film to watch and might be described as ‘cold’ and ‘distant’. The melancholic music gives it another dimension of sadness, and the old buildings and locations emanate peace and feelings of exclusion rather than exclusiveness. It is quite a simple story of a man who was unable to adapt himself to the restrictive society of Britain in the thirties, so he decides to betray and destroy this society by spying for communist Russia, to get revenge for all the disappointment he endured in school. The film doesn’t offer an easy explanation for this decision or where to place the blame.

The film starts in Moscow in 1983. An American journalist comes to interview an aged KGB spy who once betrayed his country and to ask him about his motives. The old man tells his life story.

We find ourselves in England, before the second world war, in Eton college, a very exclusive boarding school for boys of high society. One of them, Tommy Judd, is a self proclaimed communist. His best friend, Guy Bennett, is gay, which is accepted by his class mates as long as he keeps it a secret, but he is less and less willing to hide his true nature.

The film exposes the strict hierarchy of the school which is like a society in itself. The boys are divided in castes, the young pupils are the servants of the older ones (which is best shown by the returning scenes of young boys frantically cleaning the shoes of the older students). The senior prefects, called ‘the gods’, are almost almighty, but the normal prefects also have a lot of power. The best of the students are chosen to rule over the rest in the name of the headmaster. The present ‘gods’ are Barclay, Menzies and Delahay. Only Fowler has more power as head of house.

While the rest of the school is singing hymns in the courtyard two boys are caught with their pants down by a teacher. One of them is so terrified of being expelled that he commits suicide by hanging himself in the chapel. The prefects have a meeting to discuss this terrible event. Delahay expresses his regret that the headmaster got involved, expulsion wouldn’t have been necessary in his opinion. After all the gods could have settled it by giving the boys a good beating. They decide to calm everyone down with a prayer session.

Bennett has fallen in love with another student called James Harcourt, and secretly arranges to have dinner with him at a hotel. Later that night they climb out of their window and have a secret rendezvous on a boat on the school grounds. Bennett is truly in love with the boy, but he has to keep it a secret or he would be disgraced. That would mean he would never be able to become one of ‘the gods’ which has been his greatest ambition for the past years.

A very important part of the school life is the Jacker Pot, an inspection of the students in uniform by a general – the best prepared house wins. Bennett shows up with his belt and shoes unpolished, he wants his house to loose to make his arch enemy Fowler look bad. Afterwards the angry ‘gods’ threaten to beat him but he blackmails them by saying: “I shall go to Mr. Ferguson and give him the names of all the people I have done it with over the past three years and I will start at the top”. Then Delahay furiously rushes at him, thus betraying his past, but is stopped by Barclay. Bennett goes free, avoiding “the six strokes for indiscretion” and mocks Delahay: “I would have expected a sportsmen to be a better loser!”

Soon after this Fowler catches a boy who was carrying a letter from Bennett to his lover Harcourt and this time Bennett can’t escape. He can’t resort to blackmail again, because he fears for his friend. Barclay refuses to be the executor of the punishment. This gives Delahay the opportunity to take his revenge: “What’s the matter? Lost your nerve? All right, I’ll do it!”. And he doesn’t spare his hand with the cane. After the beating they shake hands like proper gentlemen.

Humilitated and crying Bennett seeks out his friend Judd. They go out for a walk and then the final disaster takes place – they meet Menzies and Davenish. Menzies announces to Bennett that Devenish will take his place as a ‘god’ , since Bennett has disgraced himself with his affair. Humiliated again Bennett swears to himself that from now on he will give himself over completely to ‘total indiscretion’. One of the main flaws in Bennet’s personality seems to be his immaturity - he can’t see his ‘enemies’ as human beings, they are only ‘tools of oppression’ to him.

Robert Addie as Delahay looks great in this role – we can see him usually marching around and barking orders, but also shocked by the suicide of his friend and hurt by the mockery of his ex-lover, he doesn’t stay as calm and distanced as a ‘god’ should be. He is shown many times in the group scenes praying, singing or parading and he really stands out from the other students.

Robert’s role as Delahay is small, but really good, it is of great importance to the story because of his hidden past. Then we start to understand why the words ‘discretion’ and ‘indiscretion’ return again and again in the dialogue between him and Bennett. And why he loses his self-control, which is absolutely not done at Eton, and why he later is so keen to beat Bennet. We can only guess what the true feelings of this character are, since they aren’t shown to us in any other way. Bennet’s revenge is in fact an answer to Delahay’s revenge, humiliation is paid with betrayal.