FILM
REVIEW – WINSTANLEY (1975)
Probably
the best historic biopic and the finest
film ever made about events from the Civil War
years, focussing on the life of Gerrard Winstanley, founder of the
radical Digger communities.
Beginning with an episodic run through the history of the war itself, with
footage of Sealed Knot (http://www.thesealedknot.org.uk/) Civil War Re-enactors in action, in well framed Black & white,
the film swiftly moves to the immediate post war years, as life began to return
to normal. The soldiers, like Winstanley,
a former member of a Parliamentarian regimente, who had taken part in
the abortive rise of the Levellers,
struggled to find work, and food.
Inspired by the Bible, Winstanley, [played with passion
by unknown school-teacher, Miles
Halliwell, rather than a professional
actor) hit on a very radical solution to
his crisis. It was accepted that
the common land around farmed properties was open to all as a free source of
firewood, water, berries, and whatever was there for the taking. Winstanley
decided to move his communal social group, known as The Diggers, right onto the
Common Land and live there. The Suffolk
land owners quickly protested, declaring the land as theirs, and denouncing the Diggers as squatters. Winstanley
argued effectively to the opposite. He
took his case to Thomas Fairfax, played by Jerome Willis, the cast’s
only well known actor, as he was a
regular performer on TV Cop show - Z-Cars) , who was surprisingly sympathetic
to Winstanley’s cause. Though he agreed on principle that the Digger squats
were technically illegal, he did not see what harm they were doing. He insisted that he could not intervene in
the crisis as none of the Diggers acted violently. Fairfax was not prepared to unleash the army or he militia on men
who had once served the Roundhead cause so nobly, and now just looked for a
better way to live for themselves.
Winstanley knew that he dared not
allow the commune to erupt into violence,
no matter how provoked. His stance in some ways predated the passive
non-resistance policies of Gandhi centuries
later.
Unfortunately, the success of the
Digger community meant that the experiment was being repeated in other
communities, and in danger of becoming
a national movement some of the communities sadly failed to resist fighting
back with force, soothe land-owners got their excuse to crush the project.
The film is ground-breaking in many ways;
its largely amateur cast give stunning performances, as does Miles Halliwell. The script is heavily drawn from the
writings of Gerrard Winstanley himself. The authenticity screams through the
film. The maker, Kevin Brownlow, even used rare breeds of pigs and livestock
that had not been changed since the 17th century period. Added to
that, the film has some powerfully improvised scenes. The moment when the
Ranters, (a rival cult to the Diggers) arrive and join the community seems to
take Winstanley and his supporters by surprise – that is because the director
never told the cast what was about to happen..
An obscure film that may just be the
best film ever made.
Arthur Chappell
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