A Diary for Timothy **** (1945, Michael Redgrave, Myra Hess, John Gielgud) – Classic Movie Review 9125

What will happen to a baby boy born in 1944, the last September of the war? Director Humphrey Jennings’s 1945 short film A Diary for Timothy is another of his Crown Film Unit classics.

Director Jennings and author E M Forster’s hauntingly written documentary captures the optimistic mood of the moment towards the end of World War Two, giving an account of the progress of the war during the first six months of the baby’s life, and Forster’s words are beautifully spoken by Michael Redgrave.

John Gielgud appears as Hamlet and George Woodbridge as The Gravedigger, in a scene from Hamlet filmed at the Haymarket Theatre, Haymarket, St. James’s, London. The pianist Dame Myra Hess appears as herself, playing an excerpt from Ludwig van Beethoven’s Piano Sonata No. 23 in F Minor, known as Appassionata, in a concert scene filmed at the National Gallery, Trafalgar Square, St James’s, London.

Timothy James Jenkins is Timothy.  He became one of the pupils in the Boys School of Varndeam Grammar School, Brighton. In his late teens, he was part of the London Mod culture. He became a grammar school teacher, but died young, in December 2000.

Humphrey Jennings in Poets’ Corner, Westminster Abbey, suggesting a shot.

A Diary for Timothy is directed by Humphrey Jennings, runs 40 minutes, is made and released by Crown Film Unit, is written by E M Forster, is shot in black and white by Fred Gamage, is produced by Basil Wright and is scored by Richard Addinsell. Muir Mathieson conducts the London Symphony Orchestra.

It was filmed between 3 September 1944 and 3 March 1945.

It is the only filmed record of Gielgud performing Hamlet in full costume and makeup, which he was doing on stage at the time of filming.

Films directed by Humphrey Jennings include: Spare Time (1939), London Can Take It! (1940), Words for Battle/ In England Now (1941), Listen to Britain (1942), Fires Were Started (1943), The Silent Village (1943), A Diary for Timothy (1945) and A Defeated People (1946).

Lindsay Anderson described Jennings in 1954 as ‘the only real poet that British cinema has yet produced’.

The BFI’s Complete Humphrey Jennings volume 3: A Diary for Timothy DVD includes The True Story of Lili Marlene (1944), The Eighty Days (1944), Myra Hess (1945), A Diary for Timothy (1946), A Defeated People (1946), The Cumberland Story (1947), The Dim Little Island (1948) and Family Portrait (1950).

© Derek Winnert 2019 Classic Movie Review 9125

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