The Molly Dineen Collection Review

• 18th Apr 2011

Molly Dineen is a name in documentary film-making that I personally had never come across before this new BFI DVD set arrived for review. She is a Bafta award winning director known for works such as Home From the Hill, In The Company of Men and Lie of the Land. This double disc set from the BFI is the first of three planned to cover the work of Dineen in its entirety. This set consists of her astounding debut Home From The Hill (1987), My African Farm (1988), Heart of the Angel (1989) and the three part In the Company of Men (1995).

Home From the Hill follows the return to the UK of former Lieutenant Colonel Hilary Hook after being abroad with the British military and as a game hunter for the majority of his life. The film has an astoundingly tragic quality as this man seems to exist in a world that has already disappeared. Having served and lived within the British Empire for his entire adult life, the revelation that a Kenyan entrepreneur wants him off their newly acquired land is a genuine shock to him. Finding himself back in England for the first time since before 1938 it appears Mr Hook has stepped into another dimension of reality. The total horror of the life he has moved to is perfectly captured as he struggles to plug a kettle into the wall, having no clue how to even switch it on. His life in Kenya had been mostly unchanged for over half a century; a group of servants making sure everything was done whilst Mr Hook read a good book on his porch. The quality of the film lies in its overwhelming level of humanity as the audience shares in the horror of Hilary Hook. The notion of change and ageing is universal and no matter where you’ve been, the realisation that things have drastically changed around you is the same for everyone.

My African Farm returns to Kenya, where Sylvia Richardson has remained in the country on her farm with her many dogs. She, like Hilary Hook, has hardly ever been in the UK itself but has no doubt whatsoever that England is her homeland.  Born in India to a diplomat, she and her family moved from post to post through the Eastern part of the Empire. Having ultimately settled in Kenya with her husband, she now tends to the farm on her own with a reduced staff of servants. Her views of the world mirror those of Hook but as she never left Kenya she has never had to confront the horror of change. Her treatment of her servants will undoubtedly offend viewers as she seems to view them as a subspecies.  Dineen again refuses to judge her character, allowing the viewer to appreciate that for Sylvia things have always been this way. When her brother arrives for Christmas and he even views his sister as stuck in the old world. He lives on the Kenyan border and has happily befriended local people, something she finds somewhat odd, to say the least.

Heart of the Angel brings Dineen back to London where she focuses on the people who keep Angel underground station operating as best it can. The film opens on the lifts recently installed at the station which, surprisingly, barely work from day to day.  Again we return to the notion of change and the modern, as the station seems at odds with itself. Plans are afoot for a total revamp which alarms the station manager as he knows he won’t be involved with the running of any modern platform. Class also seems at the forefront here; we see that those working on the tracks at night are not born in England. Dineen almost manages a modern upstairs/downstairs at one point capturing Thatcher’s new C2 upper middle class professionals upstairs and the new working class downstairs in a new kind of pit.

In the Company of Men is a three part digest on the ever-changing face of the British military. The film follows the Royal Welsh Guards on a tour of duty in Northern Ireland and the frustrations of a new kind of engagement.  Dineen follows charismatic Major Crispin Black and his men.  Major Black reads through the new yellow card guidelines at one point which detail exactly what a solider can do if a terrorist uses a car as a weapon. Very little, seems to be the answer. The regiment is sent to protect a police station over the border in Northern Ireland where Major Black points out the ludicrous situation of a hundred trained soldiers protecting eight policemen and a building. The conflict is portrayed as a strange situation where nothing much ever happens; only two men in the brigade have ever fired a weapon on active duty. The kind of active service seen by Hilary Hook in two world wars and later Korea and Burma are now a distant memory. The regiment only spring into life when getting ready to go to Brussels for a ceremonial engagement.

The concept of class is once again strongly on display as the officers, all from Harrow and Sandhurst, attempt to maintain discipline and respect among the lower class privates. Major Black has great affection for his men, as they do for their CO, even though he comes from another world entirely to theirs. The officers consider whether to make the regiment a lifelong commitment whilst the privates simply look from one tour to the next.

This first set of work from Molly Dineen is a fantastic introduction to her career, which has seen her winning BAFTA, Grierson and Royal TV Society awards. The Britain you see in these films already seems like the ancient past in some way, as progress has been rapid over the past 20 years. Dineen’s style of direction is somewhat reminiscent of early Nick Broomfield without the constant questions. She undoubtedly searches for truth as regards her chosen subjects without trying to influence the situation. Anybody interested in documentary film-making or the British Empire and its aftermath will find a great deal to enjoy in this set.

Aled Jones