In a pop-culture climate where gritty reboots, scathing irony, and winking meta-commentary are the norm, there’s something to be said for old-fashioned earnestness in contemporary cinema. John Boorman’s quasi-sequel Queen and Country is a game throwback to old British wartime dramas, but it also represents an erstwhile popular genre that audiences have long outgrown. When lines like “I fell in love with the back of your head!” are uttered without a trace of guile or self-awareness, it skirts a line of credulity.
Nearly 30 years after his account of a British family’s experience during World War II in 1987’s Hope and Glory, Boorman returns to his young, semi-autobiographical protagonist Bill Rohan (Callum Turner). Now grown up, Bill is called up to complete military training on the cusp of the Korean War. While at the army base, Rohan and his scallywag cohort Percy (Caleb Landry Jones) conspire to woo girls and mischievously elude the grasp of their unyielding commander Bradley (David Thewlis). Bill and Percy’s boys-will-be-boys adventures are presented as straightforward, harmless fun, but the film’s unapologetic commitment to retrograde gender politics—or perhaps even a complete lack of awareness that they’ve have changed at all—ring sour. For example, a peeping tom incident is played for laughs rather than the abhorrent violation it really is—when rape culture is the topic du jour, it’s hard to find the humor in a situation best forgotten, even as Boorman attempts to drown the audience in transgressive nostalgia. What’s worse is his consistently myopic view of romance.
The women of Queen and Country all fall victim to the boys’ club mentality that pervades the film. When Bill spouts the aforementioned, cringe-worthy line, it is directed at the object of his affection (Tamsin Egerton), who is nameless save for the moniker Bill bestows upon her: Ophelia. Bill dubs her this Shakespearean allusion because she always looks so very sad, you see, and deserving of a name that functions as clumsy shorthand for manic-depressive pixie dream girl going back centuries. And she truly is nothing more than a cipher for Bill to project his undying devotion. The first time she and Bill properly meet, the soundtrack tunes out her voice so he (and by proxy, the camera) can gaze upon her beauty, uninterrupted by her thoughts and desires.
Despite the presence of female characters, the film positions all women as acting in relation to how their behavior affects the men in their lives, with little interest in the emotional motivation behind the psychology. A quick jaunt to Bill’s family’s home briefly touches upon the events of Hope and Glory—namely an incident involving a decision made by Bill’s mother Grace (Sinéad Cusack), which is framed as a formative event in Bill’s life. Why did Grace do what she did so many years ago? Queen and Country has little interest in this.
These misogynistic missteps could perhaps be glossed over if Boorman’s memory exercise weren’t so broad, middle-of-the road, and uninspired. The tonally uneven mix of acting styles and mood setting, make for a frustrating viewing experience. Turner and Jones as the lead rapscallions are charming enough as chums making the best of their dry military surroundings, but by the end, Queen and Country reveals itself as a prime example of the stale storytelling and ignorant ideologies audiences waved good riddance to years ago.
One thought on ““Queen and Country””
Hmm. Interesting review. I think now I have to see it. I hope it’s an honest movie,warts and all, accurately depicting the atmosphere of the Fifties. I suspect it is. Sexism, by the way, hasn’t disappeared in our allegedly more “evolved” times. Neither has racism. Both have just become more subtly clever.