Movies - Tunes of Glory

Home > Listing Index > Movies > Tunes of Glory

	Movies - Tunes of Glory

Tunes of Glory is a 1960 film directed by Ronald Neame, based on the novel by James Kennaway, centering on events in a Scottish military barracks in the period following World War II.

Plot

The plot concerns the interactions between Major Jock Sinclair (played by Alec Guinness), the popular acting commanding officer, and his replacement Lieutenant Colonel Basil Barrow (John Mills). The two men are opposites, Sinclair being a self-made, rowdy, hard-drinking man who runs the barracks his own way, having worked his way up from a common piper. Barrow is an artistcratic, by-the-book, reserved officer from a long line of barracks COs. However, as a prisoner of war he had endured torture that left him a privately deeply troubled man. Sinclair assumes he received the more luxurious quartering officers had traditionally been given and imagines his own time spent in the military stockade was worse.

The appointment of Barrow immediately causes tensions within the regiment, particularly between the new commander and Sinclair, who engage in a struggle for the hearts and minds of the regiment. Particularly controversial is Barrow's insistence that every soldier and officer take lessons in highland dancing in an effort make their customary rowdy style more formal, and suitable for mixed company. The consequential shouting and energetic dancing of Sinclair and other senior officers at Barrow's first formal party with the townspeople incites his anger, leading an outburst that seriously damages his own authority.

The tensions come to a head when Sinclair publicly assaults a regimental piper he catches courting his daughter ("bashing a corporal" is how he puts it several times). Barrow decides an official report must be made, meaning an imminent court-martial, aware that the action will only further the erosion of his popularity, and authority, within the regiment. Barrow is eventually persuaded to back down. However, he finds that even this action does not further his popularity, and Sinclair repays his kindness by treating him with renewed lack of repect. He finds that even the senior officers believe that Sinclair is really running the barracks, arranging the dismissal of the very charges against him. When he learns he will never be respected by, let alone popular with, the regiment, he takes his own life.

With the death of Barrow, Sinclair realizes he is to blame. He calls the officers to a meeting and announces plans for a grandiose funeral, fit for a field marshal, complete with a march through the town, in which all the tunes of glory will be played by the pipers. Pointed out how out of proportion these plans are, especially given the manner of the colonel's death, Sinclair insists that it was not suicide, it was murder. He himself was the murderer, but the entire regiment were accomplices.

Critical response

The film was generally well received by critics, the acting in particular garnering praise. Guinness, who believed the performance to be among his best, was initially offered the role of Barrow. Other actors included Susannah York, Gordon Jackson, and Dennis Price, who reunited with Guinness eleven years after they played the leading roles in Kind Hearts and Coronets
. Kennaway, who adapted the screenplay from his novel, was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Adapted Screenplay. It also received numerous BAFTA nominations, including best film, and nominations for both Guinness and Mills.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Tunes of Glory ]

This page is based on the copyrighted Wikipedia article Tunes of Glory; it is used under the GNU Free Documentation License. You may redistribute it, verbatim or modified, providing that you comply with the terms of the GFDL.

Searches on eBay