THE RULING CLASS

UK, 1972, 130 minutes, Colour.
Peter O' Toole, Arthur Lowe, Alistair Sin, Coral Browne, William Mervyn, James Villiers, Carolyn Seymour, Michael Bryant, Nigel Green, Kay Walsh.
Directed by Peter Medak.

The Ruling Class is a most unusual film and well worth seeing. It was originally a stage play. The film is quite disrespectful towards Britain and the ruling class , making its points by strong satire, even ridicule. In so far as the main character is mad and thinks himself God, some have seen the film as blasphemous. This is not intended. Jack, the Earl of Gurney, tries to live by the madness of "God is love", until he is cured and enters the normal world as Jack, but not as himself, as Jack the Ripper.

The acting is excellent - Peter O' Toole received another Oscar nomination. Arthur Lowe, who has appeared in many routine comedies and specialist English films, is excellent as the socialist butler. The director is Peter Medak who made - Negatives, and A Day in the Death of Joe Egg.

1. Has it important to appreciate the various styles of comedy, satire, parody, and 'musical' in the film?

2. What was the overall impact of the film? Was it likeable?

3. How was the film a criticism of modern England, of England past, of the Empire? How universal was the criticism in the film?

4. What was said about politics, the nature of humanity?

5. Was it important for the film to have a religious setting and meaning?

6. The key character is Jack. Did you understand him? Did the audience identify with him? What insights into human nature did the portrayal of Jack give?

7. What was the meaning of the role of God in the film? What did the film say about the nature of human madness?

8. How did the interplay of characters reveal the themes, especially in terms of class? The Earl of Gurney - Charles - Clare - Dimsdale - the Bishop -the ladies of the village - the Master of Lunacy - the police - the peers in the House of Lords - Tucker - Grace - the Doctor?

9. Comment on the changes in all these characters' throughout the film.

10. The sequence of the Electric Messiah - how humorous was this at first, and how serious by the end?

11. Comment on the sequences you found particularly meaningful.

12. What was the effect of the songs in the film, their style, sudden intrusion into the action?

13. The film was accused of being blasphemous. Do you agree?

14. Do you think this film was of value to a wide commercial audience?

15. The importance of character detail. Did you understand him? Did the audience identify with him? If the audience did not identify with Jack in some way, what would be the impact of the film? Comment on your impressions of the first Jack we met; religious, mad, happy, full of insights, the use of madness to show something of normality? What were your impressions of the "normal" Jack, (he was still mad)? He still thought that he was God even though he acted as Jack the Ripper. It was only the normal, but mad. Jack who could be accepted by modern society. And he was finally accepted amongst the dead ruling class. Why did Jack think he was God? First, the God of Love, then, the God of fear? What insights into human nature did the portrayal of Jack give?

16. The interplay of characters:
- The Earl of Gurney: Typical with his toast, his relationship to Tucker, his reminiscence of his past and his own status, his madness, the accident of his death, his funeral.
- Charles: pompous, self-righteous, hypocritical as regards marriage, greedy, bullying, wanting to preserve the old tradition.
- Clare: cold and greedy, sexually unsatisfied, grasping, yet she showed that she had possibilities for insight, but she failed to respond, her listening to Jack as J.CT, her insight into Charles, Grace and the doctor, but her selling herself for power, the result was her death. (She had made herself the equivalent of a prostitute to be killed by Jack the Ripper).
- Dimsdale: as stupid, as the offspring of such ruling class, without insight, without tact, jumping on the bandwagon to support Jack.
- The Bishop: a satire on the established church, on the conventions of religions, insinuating that the church is doddery, especially in relation to the insights of God as lived by a madman. (The Bishop finding it hard to get to his knees); the marriage ceremony, the Church bullied by the ruling class, the final scene of the bishop in the wheelchair.
- The ladies of the village: their pretensions, their bonhomie, their aligning themselves with the values and manners of the ruling class, yet drunk etc. at the hunt.
- The Master of Lunacy: Eton as more important than truth.
- The police: their subservience to the ruling class, their admiration for Jack's handing over of Tucker.
- The Peers in the House of Lords: as wanting punishment and fear, to put down those below them, their appearing as skeletons in cobwebs.

17. The ruling class versus the lower class: Tucker, Grace, the foreign doctor.
- Tucker: how successful was Arthur Lowe's performance in giving insight into the butler-type, what is going on in the butler-type's mind, and the possibilities of telling the truth to the ruling class. Tucker's behaviour and comments? How much should the audience agree with Tucker? His alignment with the socialists and the communists? His being the victim of the ruling class in being arrested for murder? At the end he is still the victim of the ruling class.
- Grace: as selfish and ambitious, as unscrupulous, her deception as the lady of the Camelias. Her coarseness, her contrast with the ruling people, especially Clare - Yet her response to Jack's madness, just as Tucker responded to Jack in his madness. The change in Grace after the wedding - with the satire of the strip scene on their wedding night, the birth of the child, and her growing love and appreciation for Jack? Her death? Did she deserve it by the end of the-dim?
- The Doctor: that he was not English, that he understood Jack, that he was trying to help Jack? Did he deserve to be as mad as the Electric Messiah at the end?

18. Important sequences: the initial toast to England, the hanging of the Earl, the marriage night and the strip-tease. Jack on the cross, his speech in the House of Lords. What were your final impressions of love versus fear and normality? Consider especially Jack and Grace as biros, her dancing with Jack the Ripper and her destruction and his speech in the House of Lords.

19. The impact of the end, after the speech, the serenity and easiness of Grace's song, and her sudden silence and death? The ruling class ultimately destroys?