WHEN THE WIND BLOWS

UK, 1987, 85 minutes, Colour.
Voices of John Mills, Peggy Ashcroft.
Directed by Jimmy Murakami.

When the Wind Blows is based on the story by Raymond Briggs, who adapted it for the screen. It is British animation - quite arrestingly drawn with very British styles for the humans but quite vivid backgrounds for the house in Sussex as well as for the impact of the dropping the bomb and its disaster aftermath. The film also has the advantage of having Peggy Ashcroft and John Mills as supplying the voices for the elderly Sussex couple, Jim and Hilda Bloggs, who are quite unaware of the impending disaster, look at the information given to help them for the nuclear blast but misunderstand it, experience the blast and again do all the wrong things and gradually become ill and die.

The film is a very strong anti-nuclear parable, alerting people to the dangers and the aftermath of the blast. Released in 1986, the film came in the aftermath of the nuclear consciousness of the early '80s in and such films as The Day After, Testament, Silkwood, One Night Stand. However, with the end of the '80s and the collapse of the Soviet empire, the film seems to be set in a more remote past.

There is a varied musical score including theme songs by such artists as David Bowie.

One of the difficulties with the film is that the two central characters, despite the skill in the voices, seem to talk incessantly, which has an alienating effect on the audience.

1.Impact of the film? Entertainment? Message?

2.The quality and style of the animation? Audience response to the animated characters and their situations? In comparison with a realistic treatment? The portrait of the characters, their background, the action? Colours, design and shapes? The musical score and the songs? Their message? The voices of John Mills and Peggy Ashcroft?

3.The status of the story as literature? Literature studied in schools and educational institutions? The impact of the message in the book? Adapted by the author for the screen?

4.The nature of the message? Its reaching the audience like the Bloggses - or not? British - or universal? The atmosphere of the early '80s, renewal of Cold War, American and Soviet threats? The tradition of films on nuclear disasters? The presentation of the ordinary couple, ageing, ignorant, not understanding the situation, responding wrongly? The experience of the disaster, not coping? The pessimistic ending?

5.The Sussex setting, the village and the house? The memories of World War Two and how they coped? The assumptions about World War Three as like World War Two? The memories and ghosts of the past? The imagined Russian soldier? The elderly couple not aware of society, international politics?

6.Jim and Hilda as characters, their age and experience, memories? Their incessant talking? The quality of their relationship, loving, taking each other for granted? The British style of conversation, interchange, bickering? Reading the leaflets, building the Core refuge? Building it out of doors and cushions - and not following the directions? Their ignorance? Trying to remember that the enemy was the Russian?

7.The announcement of the war, the radio voice? The three minutes, the rapidity? The impact of the blast? The picturing of the consequent devastation and the countryside?

8.The Bloggses and all the amenities being cut off - water, electricity, radio, television, telephone, newspapers, food? Their attitude towards expecting emergency relief? Their experiences, drinking the water, not appreciating the fallout, not seeing it? The house in a mess?

9.Their growing ill, their reaction to growing ill? The realisation of what has happened? the retreat to the Core room? Refuge, preparation for death? Praying?

10.The impact of the film? Its intended audience? The wide audience - or preaching to the converted?