Campbell's Kingdom (1960)

just watch it!

Very interesting film. Was caught on the premise when seeing the trailer but unsure as to what the outcome would be for the showing. As it turns out, it was a very good film.

Just intense enough to provide a much-needed diversion, just lightweight enough to make you forget about it soon after it’s over. It’s not exactly “good,” per se, but it does what it sets out to do in terms of putting us on edge, which makes it … successful?

Mostly, the movie is committed to the value of a good time.

In the 1950s - in stark contrast to today - people were queueing up to leave Britain.Fed up with post -war austerity,rationing,low wages,class distinction and crap weather hundreds of thousands opted for healthier,more prosperous climes.Many became" £10 Poms ",taking an assisted passage to Australia,I barely escaped that fate myself,my father - an electrical engineer - being offered a promotion and a move to the south coast a few months before we would have sailed.Others made for other former colonies that offered a fresh start,Canada being the most popular alternative destination.To any waverers amongst them,the magnificent setting of "Campbells Kingdom" might well have acted as the clincher.The actors,the plot,the script,all are secondary to the majestic great outdoors that dominates the film.It is a "Kingdom" indeed fit for a king. Taken from a Hammond Innes novel,the film tells the story of a dying man who goes to Canada to claim his inheritance,but of course he's Dirk Bogarde and he isn't really dying at all but he does get to show his 3/4 profile a lot and look rather archly at the camera because this was before we discovered he could act and we were quite happy for him to put a cigarette in his elegant mouth and smoulder. Stanley Baker is,unsurprisingly,the bad guy,and he has thin lips and sneers at Dirk rather unpleasantly.He and several other members of the cast all make courageous but ill - advised attempts at the Canadian accent.I wish they hadn't - but there it is. I enjoyed this in 1958,smoking my "Gitanes"(pretentious - moi?) and blowing bubbles down the straw of my "Kia - Ora" in my innocent uncritical way,but after half a century of determined movie - going it now looks like little more than a travelogue plagued by some pretty appalling acting. Its always a pleasure to watch the young Mr Bogarde valiantly trying to express real emotion but falling short of the mark and he does it a lot here.But,bless him,he kept at it and eventually got it right a few years later in "Victim".But,as I ground the stub of my "Gitane" into the carpet and dropped my empty "Kia - Ora " under the seat,I just wanted him to punch Stanley Baker..

I remember the praise being heaped on this film as well as on Dirk Bogard when it was first released. I was about nine years old, and never got to see this spectacle at that time. I saw it for the first time on Film 4 recently, and was quite impressed with the cinematography (It was 1957 British of course), but the casting I felt left a lot to be desired. Plenty of English (and Welsh) actors, with corny Canadian accents (Syd James, who was actually South African), and a terrible accent from one I thought could deliver. James Robertson Justice's effort was terrible. In fact, at an exciting part of the plot when my old hero was barking instructions to a beleaguered cast of mis-fits, his almost falsetto pitched voice reminded me of the Goon Show Bluebottle just before he was blown up! A typical British effort of that time.

Well looking at some comments I thought it prudent to add mine in the defence of a remarkable film.Unlike some location flicks and despite the efforts of dramatic scenery this film is failed by it's casting. A film about a Scot in Canada and not a Scot or Canadian accent in site!There is however a strong British cast assembled for filming abroad, a rare treat for Bogarde and co in post war austere Britain and a rare treat of course for the audience - colour! So please accept it for what it is. A rare colour British melodrama to cheer and entertain and perhaps re-awaken the declining film audience of the time.If you are one that enjoyed the old days of an old black and white TV flickering away on a Sunday afternoon playing a comfort film then this is one to watch one day.I really don't understand what James Robertson Justice is doing in this, despite his Scottish roots he performs out of character (typecasting above all is the problem here),perhaps he should have played to his strengths and played the part as a booming eccentric, a Major perhaps?!. All the rest give their best and stoic Dirk Bogarde of course is excellent!I like the warm feeling this film brings to the watcher good may or may not triumph over evil here. I leave you to watch and enjoy the really well worked climatic end. Over sentimental at the conclusion? Perhaps! Glad it was made? Definitely! Enjoy a sweet film.The end.

This film scores best in it's fine sense of location, which is to be applauded as the post war industry made the effort to escape from Hertfordshire and Buckinghamshire.Where it falls down is the residual ambiance, among the actors, that they are still in 'Titfield Thunderbolt' country.(OK. So that was filmed in Somerset). Nice in light comedy, Bogarde never really convinced in action roles and though Baker may have convinced some (Himself maybe) that he was tough, one feels that a Broderick Crawford or Richard Boone, possibly even James Mason, (if thinly sliced) would have eaten them both on toast, . Watch for the 'two shot' when Bogarde confronts Baker in the saloon and the bottle of 'Canada Club' whisky on the table jumps on and off its tray.