Customer Reviews

Heroes & Villains: The Last Englishman [VHS]

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Imagine a character from a Monty Python sketch. One of Graham Chapman's dotty military men, with a John Cleese gait, perhaps. Now imagine that you learn to admire this coot, getting to respect his single-minded (okay, fanatical) adherence to principle and a code of honor. Much as Powell & Pressburger taught us to be fond of pompous old Colonel Blimp, we are shown the ethics behind the eccentricity.

I'm certain that a Brit would have an easier time with the shorthand of telling this rather remarkable story in just an hour -- many of Col. Wintle's escapades were national legend. He was one of the last people imprisoned in the Tower of London! He captured a French town single-handed in the Great War! He went behind enemy lines in WWII, and tried to steal an English plane to do it sooner!

Someone from the UK would be intimately familiar with the format used to tell the story, as well. Jim Broadbent's Wintle is a guest on the BBC Radio institution Desert Island Discs, the longest-running radio show in history (still on the air), and tells us his story (accompanied by flashbacks) as he's being interviewed about what music he would take with him to the (proverbial) desert island. "I am never bored when I am present," he told a journalist upon release from one of his incarcerations. If you pay strict attention while watching this, neither will you be.

The Last Englishman is about a real British army officer called Lt. Col. A.D.Wintle MC who fought in both World Wars. He was a great individualist who did not tolerate incompetent officials, officers and their like. He did not worry about upsetting people if he deemed their inactivity or obtuse thinking was unpatriotic. His actions were always direct and often unpopular with his enemies on both sides. He did time as a prisoner in the Tower of London and even managed to shame the Commandant and his men in a prison in Vichy France to change sides and become resistance fighters rather than to continue working with the Germans.

Buy the DVD and you will not regret it, let it inspire you and you will then realise what we have lost.

If you wish to waste an hour in front of the tv then enjoy it by watching this. That the story, retold in this BBC production, is entirely true is just the icing on the cake.

There is much in this film to be admired and enjoyed. It delights the soul and tweaks the heart. Well done and well acted. The music is wonderful. I would recommend it to anyone who enjoys history as well as the English 'starch'.