CARNIVAL

UK, 1946, 93 minutes, Black and white.
Sally Gray, Michael Wilding, Stanley Holloway, Catherine Lacey, Bernard Miles, Jean Kent.
Directed by Stanley Haynes.

Carnival is based on a novel by British author Compton Mc Kenzie. It has a turn of the century setting, focusing on the contrast between rich and poor in England, a young woman of strong personality who becomes a dancer, wants a good time, encounters an artist. She has to suffer from her alcoholic father and her jealous mother. She also has a crippled sister.

The film has touches of melodrama - though is much lighter in tone than the kinds of melodramas made at this time by the Gainsborough Studios with such stars as Margaret Lockwood, James Mason, Phyllis Calvert and Stewart Granger. However, the film is in something of this vein. Sally Gray is the strong minded heroine. Michael Wilding is the dilettante artist. Stanley Holloway and Catherine Lacey are the parents of the heroine.

1. Entertaining British drama, 40s style? The look at the past, the interpretation of the past? Relevance to the 40s? Later decades?

2. Black and white photography, period settings? The musical score?

3. The title and its focus?

4. The prologue with Jenny's birth? The three aunts and their wealth, memories of their father, aristocratic attitudes? their disdain of Charlie? Their going to Florence, wanting to adopt a child? Florence and Charlie rejecting their offer? The focus on Jenny Pearl and the giving of her name?

5. Charlie and Florence in middle age? Charlie as friendly, with his friends, drinking? His love for Florence and trying to please her? His exasperation and going out? Love for his daughter? His talking loudly during her performance and his pride? Their wariness about her life? The encounter with Maurice? His having to let his daughter grow up? Florence and her concern about herself, her faded looks, her lost opportunities? Her jealousy and tantrums, her control of Jenny?

6. Jenny, glamorous, the dancer, the pride of her parents? The young sister looking up to her? Her good time, with men? Coming home late? Her mother's tantrums? Her having to live with them? Her encounters with Maurice, critical of the art? Meeting him again, in love, together? His proposal that they live together? Her turning him down? The boarder, his bewilderment by her way of life? His attraction, going to the theatre? The relationship between the two? Her relationship with Maurice? The beach - and ultimate tragedy?

7. Jenny's sister, crippled, at home, looking up to Jenny? Their talks together? Their tolerance of their mother and trying to bear with her?

8. The boarder, coming to the house, his shyness, his narrow outlook? His going to the theatre, his reaction? Attracted to Jenny? Proposal? Her reaction, his jealousy, the gun and the tragedy?

9. Maurice and the art world? His sketcher friend? The exhibitor, the art critic and his pomposity? Jenny and her criticisms? Maurice and his going to the theatre, infatuation, outings? Their love? His proposal that they live together? Jerry turning him down? His continued love for her, tragedy?

10. Turn of the century melodrama - the stuff of popular and classic novels? Transferred to the screen?