A weird sop to the RAF, directed by several big names including not only our very own patron saint Michael Powell but also Brian ‘Empress of All Ireland’ Desmond Hurst (and an uncredited Alexander Korda) and starring an entire phalanx of stars including Sir Rich Ralphardson as a Wing Commander (Wing Commander Richardson, actually) and Dame Flora Robson To Name But Three as Queen Elizabeth I, which two characters may help to point to the unusual nature of this sort-of documentary. We suppose that the huge amount of fannying around in flannels in and out of chintzy drawing rooms in that way we suppose British filmmakers of the time must have presumed seemed reassuring to the rest of the populace crammed in single room dwellings with no hot water means this was meant to come out during the woar but bloody Hitler turned it in before that could happen (oh! He really was a liability!) which surprising turn of events made this almost entirely redundant, unless Merle Oberon whining on about not wanting to give up her land was an oblique tilt at Clem Attlee. Anyway, the Elizabeth I bit is good, the rest is tosh. Which we suppose would be David Starkey’s judgement on the progression of British history as a whole.
