Cinema
The Way We Live
Jill Craigie · 1946
Synopsis
Plymouth, in the aftermath of the war. The bombing has thrown tens of thousands of inhabitants onto the street. The Copperwheat family, who have lost their home, wait to be rehoused and live cramped in temporary accommodation. A journalist who has come to investigate discovers the plan to rebuild the city on a different design, and the city divides: to remake it as it was, or to conceive another, made for its new needs.
Context
The film was shot in 1945 and 1946 in a city still in ruins, with three thousand inhabitants in front of the camera and a single professional actor; it mixes documentary and fiction around the reconstruction plan drawn up in 1943, and gives a place to the city's young women. The Rank managing director, John Davis, tried to halt the shooting, at the request, according to the British Film Institute, of Nancy Astor, Conservative MP for Plymouth; Craigie, for her part, attributed it to Davis's rivalry with her producer, Filippo Del Giudice. There she met Michael Foot, filmed campaigning at Devonport, whose MP he was to become.
Who it is for
One hour four minutes, in English, viewable free of charge online on the website of the British Film Institute; no French-subtitled version is known.
Prizes and reception
Presented in competition at Cannes in 1946, it broke attendance records in Plymouth.
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